A redundant love
A redundant love
The majority of people seemed lost for words this week after
the government's insensitive plan to fork out Rp 26.5 billion
(US$1.7 million) on a retirement home for former president
Soeharto became public knowledge.
The plan was announced by Minister/State Secretary Akbar
Tandjung in the midst of an economic catastrophe. It is worth
noting that the minister is President B.J. Habibie's most
frequent spokesman.
Political observers and some members of the House of
Representatives denounced the decision as inappropriate and said
it was unwise to approve frivolous expenditure at a time when the
government is facing an unprecedented monetary crisis and people
are starving.
This decision must have been felt like a stab in the heart by
the 80 million people living under the poverty line and the
parents of six million children who have failed to enroll in
primary school this year because of the ruinous state of the
economy.
The ugly reality is that the government remained unmoved
despite the outcry and decided that the show must go on. Akbar
said the authorities were aware of the economic crisis, but added
"that shouldn't lessen our appreciation of Pak Harto."
We strongly believe that the decision, regardless of its
legality, is terribly untimely. Soeharto, who lives in a large
bungalow surrounded by his immensely wealthy children in the
first class area of Menteng in Central Jakarta, does not need a
house at this moment in time. Nor is he in financial trouble
because he paid for the construction of the 3,000 square meter
mansion, built on a one hectare site near his museum in East
Jakarta, all by himself.
Only people with a low capability for rational thought believe
that the former president of the most corrupt country in Asia
lives only on his Rp 15 million (US$1,000) monthly pension, as he
himself has repeatedly claimed.
If the government was concerned that Soeharto had spent his
way into trouble by financing the construction of the mansion by
himself then that was a most naive presumption because Soeharto
declined to accept the offer, as Akbar announced yesterday.
Moreover, Soeharto has not yet filed a law suite against
Forbes magazine for repeatedly printing stories accusing him of
amassing stakes in about 3,200 Indonesian companies and a family
fortune worth $4 billion during the 32 years of his despotic
rule. This newfound tolerance is surprising in a man who banned
30 newspapers and magazines when he was in power.
The most likely reason behind the government determination to
pay for Soeharto's mansion was not only to demonstrate its
sincere appreciation of the former head of state but also because
of a superfluous feeling of love held for him by his successor,
who once called him his professor of politics.
In the words of former Golkar secretary-general Rachmat
Witoelar, granting Soeharto the money shows that the key decision
makers in the cabinet are still Soeharto loyalists with no sense
of crisis.
So now Indonesians should brace themselves for some more pro-
Soeharto policies, for example a sham probe into Soeharto's
assets -- which are believed to have been illegally accumulated
-- as another token of redundant love.