Following a hotly-contested election campaign and aftermath in the Philippines, incumbent President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo was sworn in June 30 for a new six-year term. She immediately announced plans for strict austerity and frugality both in public and private life in order to cope with the country’s mounting debt burden, budget deficit, credit rating and unemployment.

The first round of Indonesia’s first direct popular election for the presidency unfolded relatively calmly on July 5. The vote throughout this sprawling archipelago of more than 220 million persons in Southeast Asia was hailed as a major and successful expression of democracy in many Asian and Western circles, but as Dr Klaus H. Schreiner, a veteran observer and participant in Indonesian affairs, relates, the eventual outcome is still highly uncertain and whoever claims the presidency may face a continuing contentious political environment. And both the recent April parliamentary election and the presidential campaign were largely devoid of specifics and policy positions.

Seemingly against virtually all odds, the Congress Party and its allies, who started the campaign in a timid position of apparent inferiority and gloom, were swept into power May 13 by a majority of Indian voters unconvinced that Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee’s slogans and economic prosperity referred to them.

The world’s largest election process began in early April in India in relative calm and continued optimism and was expected to culminate in May with the re-election of the Nationalist-led coalition of Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee and a shift to a new generation of hereditary leadership in the main opposition.