EMILIO MORENATTI / AP

BALLOTS AND BURQAS: Afghan women cast their ballots in the October presidential election

Making Their Mark
	Half a billion Asians cast their votes in elections in 2004, and proved that democracy—hard-fought, raucous and ever more vibrant—has become an Asian value
	By Anthony Spaeth

Posted Sunday, December 19, 2004
Say what you want about democracy, but you can't deny that it's often rowdy, as the residents of Ngampilan, a densely populated district on Java, know very well. During the elections that followed the downfall of Indonesian strongman Suharto in 1998, Ngampilan became known as a place where violence was bound to break out, a "red district" in police parlance. In the polls of 1999, overheated party supporters threw Molotov cocktails on the main road, and special forces from the Indonesian navy were ordered in to keep the peace.

But at this year's presidential election, Ngampilan proved it had grown up. Local officials in formal Javanese dress greeted voters with traditional bows. Residents volunteered platters of snacks. A meeting between police and party leaders held six weeks before the polls helped calm things down. Sugiati, a 57-year-old grandmother of four and community leader, lectured local hotheads known to favor the party of Megawati Sukarnoputri, the incumbent President. "They listen," says Sugiati, "to a mother figure like me." No violent incidents were recorded in either the first round of the election in April or the runoff five months later, in which Megawati lost to Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono "There was excitement in the air," says Sugiati. "It was like a family wedding party."

The celebrations weren't limited to Javanese towns. Asia will remember 2004 as the year of the hard-fought, often momentous election. Never before have so many Asians used the power of the ballot to elect Presidents or parliaments. Indonesians and Afghans were allowed to pick their countries' leaders for the first time in decades. South Korea's legislative election in April—the cleanest in the nation's history—essentially overruled the impeachment of President Roh Moo Hyun five weeks earlier. Taiwan's voters returned Chen Shui-bian to power despite—or because of—his determination to annoy Beijing on the matter of the island's autonomy. (Chen's re-election was also the year's most controversial race, swung by an assassination attempt that his rivals maintain was staged.) After a typically rambunctious campaign, Philippine voters gave President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo a new term in office, while their Indian counterparts tossed out Atal Bihari Vajpayee, who was on proud watch when India became the new Asian economic power. Tiny Hong Kong used a legislative poll to send a message to Beijing that it wants and deserves greater freedoms in democracy. And so, to celebrate and honor a momentous year, TIME has chosen as its Asian Newsmaker for 2004 not one person but the estimated 590 million individuals who decided that their votes made a difference, whether they cast them by the mark of a tick, the puncture of a ballot card, or a thumbprint. The Asian voter, whether male or female—even in Afghanistan, 41% of the registered electorate are women—took down some governments, extended the life of others, and reminded those who presumed to lead that in much of modern Asia, support has to be earned.

To be sure, none of Asia's exercises in democracy were perfect. Asian nations with electoral democracies demonstrate the full spectrum of flaws. Japan has long been dominated by a single party, and the elected government shares power with an unelected, entrenched bureaucracy. India has not yet built a functioning judiciary or a relatively clean civil service. The media are inhibited in Singapore and Malaysia. The Philippines revels in its democracy and brags of the noisiest press in the region—but during the presidential campaign in 2004, 126 people were murdered in election-related violence.

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