Until Suharto was toppled in 1998, Indonesia’s parliament was little more than a rubber stamp whose purpose was to give a veneer of legitimacy to the general’s dictatorship.

On Thursday, 11 years and four presidents later, the latest crop of legislators is sworn in. This time there are, for the first time, high hopes that the 560 incoming lawmakers from nine parties will transform one of Indonesia’s least-respected institutions into a credible pillar of the country’s burgeoning democracy.