Many delegates are describing the World Movement for Democracy’s 6^th Assembly as its best yet. There is much still to be said and done, but as delegates anticipate this evening’s closing awards ceremony, many agree that nothing is likely to top Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono’s address.

Participants were still buzzing about the speech some 24 hours later.  

The speech was a forceful and eloquent articulation of the underlying principles and rationale for the country’s striking democratic transition.

“What has happened in Indonesia is the most significant gain for democracy since the great events of 1989,” said Carl Gershman, president of the Washington-based National Endowment for Democracy. The country’s achievement is all the more remarkable when the experience of states like Thailand confirms how difficult and fragile democratic consolidation can be, he told a press conference at Jakarta’s Shangri-La hotel.

Ten years after the ‘Reformasi’ elections in 1999, Indonesian democracy is “irreversible and a daily fact of life,” Yudhoyono told the assembled democracy advocates.

Indonesia’s experience confirmed that freedom need not be sacrificed on the altar of economic growth and that in an ethnically diverse society, democracy was vital for resolving conflict and ensuring genuine pluralism.

Under Suharto’s regime, Indonesia’s political development was stymied by “an authoritarian system that sought stability, development and national unity at all costs.”

“Today, our democracy is growing strong,” Yudhoyono said. “While at the same time, Indonesia is registering the third-highest economic growth among G-20 countries, after China and India.”

Yudhoyono did not deny that corruption remains a serious threat to political integrity.  

“Money politics can seriously undermine democracy because it induces elected leaders and politicians to serve their pay masters at the expense of the public good,” he said.

But Indonesian democracy gets its vibrancy and dynamism from the fact that it emerged and developed indigenously, reflecting the aspirations and values of ordinary citizens.

“Our democracy came out of a political crisis that was triggered by the financial crisis in 1997, which originated from outside our borders,” he said. “But the desire to get rid of corruption, collusion and nepotism came wholly from within.”

The speech was notable for affirming that Islam, democracy and modernization are not only compatible, but perhaps even complementary.

“There is no conflict between religious, spiritual and political obligations as citizens in pluralism and the capability to participate in the modern world,” Yudhoyono said.

The only notable omission in the speech was the foreign policy dimension, notably the conspicuous failure to mention the Bali Democracy Forum, and Indonesia’s more assertive role in promoting human rights within the ASEAN bloc. While India has been disappointingly lax in this respect, Indonesia is emerging as a potential force in challenging the region’s authoritarian regimes – not least in Burma, aka Myanmar - if only by the power of its example.

“We are looking so much for Yudhoyono to play a role in bringing a change in Myanmar because he has the capability for this. His military background and experience in Jakarta in its political reform would support that mission,” says the NED’s Gershman.