JP/NurhayatiOne year since she was virtually hounded out of her Cabinet post in Indonesia by the country’s powerful politicians, Sri Mulyani Indrawati appears to have settled well in her job as the number two person in the World Bank headquarters in Washington.
As managing director, she has her plate full to keep her busy around the clock as she oversees 74 countries in the three regions entrusted to her: the East Asia Pacific, the Middle East and North Africa, and Latin America and the Caribbean.
This is quite a departure from her previous job. Settling in from a job of overseeing the economy of one single country to one that deals with the development of 74 countries, each with its own political, cultural and economic situation, has been, “very interesting but also challenging”, she says in an interview.
Each country has a different problem that needs a specific solution. “There is no one size fits all,” she adds.
And then there is the globe-trotting that comes with her job, visiting trouble spots around the globe and meeting with leaders of donor and recipient countries.
In the 10 months since she joined the Bank, she has visited 19 countries, including Indonesia, Japan, China and India, West Bank and Gaza, Mexico and Peru.
She addressed the ASEAN financial ministers meeting in Bali this month, her first public appearance in her home soil since she left under controversial circumstances last year, and learned that she remains as popular as she was then, at least going by the huge media attention lavished on her rather than to the substance of the ASEAN meeting itself.
Clearly mindful of the political goings-on back home, including the campaign by friends for her to contest the presidential elections in Indonesia in 2012, Sri Mulyani remains very much focused on her present job. She keeps her political views private.
Ever the professional technocrat, she pursues her work with the same dedication and vigor as she had with all her previous jobs, including in serving in the Cabinet of President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono since 2004 until last year.
“I always enjoy the job and the work that I do, because that’s the condition that I attach in accepting any job. This way, I can really work and dedicate myself to the institution for achieving the goal which I believe is a noble one.”
She sees her role today as an international civil servant helping people across the world.
“As the Indonesian saying goes, work is ibadah [literally: worship],” says the woman who, when she was finance minister, was known to be burning the midnight oil.
The interview in her cozy and spacious office on the 12th floor of the World Bank headquarters on Pennsylvania Avenue was limited to 30 minutes as she was busy preparing for the annual spring meetings of the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund.
Sri Mulyani is no stranger to working in an international setting or to the high-powered Washington environment, having served as executive director for the IMF representing Southeast Asia.
She received her doctorate from the University of Illinois in Urban-Champagne in 1992 and worked as a USAID consultant in Georgia, Atlanta.
She came to the World Bank with very strong credentials, having built her reputation for integrity as finance minister and coordinating minister for the economy in Indonesia.
The accusation by the House of Representatives last year that she had abused her power in bailing out a small bank in 2008 had not the least dented her reputation in Washington.
The Indonesian Anti-Corruption Campaign (KPK) has not found any evidence of crime in her move to bail out Bank Century. Politically she may be faulted but legally she remains in the clear. World Bank President Robert Zoelick has included overseeing the integrity of vice presidency among the many additional tasks for her.
As far as workload is concerned, Sri Mulyani says it is more challenging as she has to deal with staff coming from more than 170 countries, each with different cultural background. The fact that they all share the same development goal helps, she says.
“It’s demanding but manageable,” she said.
The bank’s new paradigm of greater openness and transparency suited Sri Mulyani’s own personal style as she had reformed the Indonesian finance ministry very much in the same way when she was in charge.
She also seems at ease in crossing the political boundary, in the past a technocrat no-no but increasingly becoming inevitable as the Bank now addresses the issue of governance and corruption.
But she insists that when she addresses these issues, she was reflecting the institutional rather than her personal views.
Development as a subject today has become very multidimensional that includes also the issue of governance, transparency and accountability besides the economic aspect, she says.
“We need to build trust of both shareholders and clients. This institution is not telling what needs to be done. But we need to apply ourselves what we think is right. So transparency, accountability, and access to information become the principles that we also apply,” she says.
Don’t expect Sri Mulyani to do special favors for Indonesia, even though the World Bank has a large operation in the country.
“The Bank has a mechanism to prevent conflict of interests among staff and management,” she says. Whenever the executive board convenes to make a decision on Indonesia, she will sit it out and let the other managing director, Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, chair it. And conversely, when the board convenes on Nigeria, Sri Mulyani will chair it.
This then begs the question that many of her political nemesis in Indonesia are asking: What exactly is Sri Mulyani doing for the nation?
Possible the best answer is that she represents Indonesia at its best, one of the rare Indonesians who have made it to the top in the international arena.
Although traveling as a World Bank staffer, she would still be recognized as someone hailing from Indonesia, and one who was recruited to the job because of her impeccable reputation.
She is not just someone who is intelligent, hard working, truly dedicated to her job, but also someone with tons of knowledge and experience in managing an economy as large and complex as Indonesia and who is now willing to share them all in helping people across the globe. And she is also recognized for her integrity.
She is still doing her part for her country whenever she can, in spite of her busy schedule. She has agreed to take part in a round of discussion to discuss a new vision with Indonesian students and young professionals based in the United States who are being assembled by Indonesian ambassador to the US Dino Patti Djalal in May.
“I am still an Indonesian citizen,” she says.
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