Offer to delay bill fails to quiet critics<\/p>\n
JAKARTA (JP): \"Not good enough!\" was the general reaction of
\npoliticians and rights campaigners over the government's decision
\nto postpone, rather than scrap, the state security bill.<\/p>\n
They further decried the reason given for postponing the
\nenactment of bill -- to allow time for information on it to be
\ndisseminated and better understood by the public -- as an insult
\nto the people who were well aware of the bill's implications.<\/p>\n
Sri Bintang Pamungkas, chairman of the Indonesian Democratic
\nUnion Party (PUDI), said there should be no compromise on the
\nbill's rejection.<\/p>\n
\"The students, with their movement, should continue their
\nstruggle,\" said Sri Bintang was in Purwokerto, Central Java, over
\nthe weekend.<\/p>\n
\"They are the only ones who can save us from the arbitrary
\nconduct of the government and the military\".<\/p>\n
While the protests had died down by Sunday following the
\nannouncement that ratification of the bill would be postponed,
\nthe resonance of discontent prevailed.<\/p>\n
National Mandate Party (PAN) chairman Amien Rais remarked that
\nthe government did the right thing in delaying the bill. \"In fact
\nit should be canceled altogether.\"<\/p>\n
\"If it doesn't, people will start questioning 'What is it
\nreally up to?'\" Amien said here on Saturday.<\/p>\n
Critics argue that the bill could give unchecked power to the
\npresident and the military.<\/p>\n
Two prominent legal organizations -- the Indonesian Legal Aid
\nand Human Rights Association (PBHI) along with the Foundation of
\nthe Indonesian Legal Aid Institute (YLBHI) -- both launched
\nscathing attacks on the government.<\/p>\n
\"The postponement reflects the stubbornness of and lack of
\nconsciousness by the government, which continues, without any
\nsensitivity, to blame the people,\" PBHI said in a statement
\nsigned by its director, Hendardi.<\/p>\n
\"The Indonesian people do not need nor did they demand a
\npostponement of the bill, rather they simply have no need for a
\nbill which was formulated under mistaken and erroneous
\nassumptions.<\/p>\n
\"The argument given to delay the bill, that the people do not
\nunderstand it yet, is a phony excuse to force its will,\" PBHI
\nsaid.<\/p>\n
The YLBHI sneered at the government's reasoning for postponing
\nthe bill. \"It is an insult to the intelligence and aptitude of
\nthe people.<\/p>\n
\"The problem is in the unfair substance of the bill, not the
\ndissemination,\" read the statement signed by YLBHI chairman
\nBambang Widjojanto and secretary Dadang Trisasongko.<\/p>\n
They added that despite the postponement, \"there was no
\nguarantee that next week or in the next couple of days the bill
\nwould not be forcefully ratified and implemented by Habibie\".<\/p>\n
Meanwhile in Bandung, West Java, Minister\/State Secretary
\nMuladi defended the government's move to present the bill to the
\nHouse and denied suggestions that it was part of a grand
\npolitical scheme to garner power.<\/p>\n
\"What you should ask is why the Special Session of the
\nPeople's Consultative Assembly (MPR) in November 1998 decreed
\nthat the government should make such a bill... If the government
\ndidn't draft the bill it would have had to be accountable,\"
\nMuladi remarked. (30\/43\/45)<\/p>",
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