ABRI faction rejects presidency law demand
JAKARTA (JP): The powerful Armed Forces faction in the House of Representatives is unsympathetic to students' demand for a law on the presidential institution.
It argued yesterday that matters on the institution is "clear enough" because it is already mentioned in 15 paragraphs of the 1945 Constitution and regulated in a decree issued by the People's Consultative Assembly.
The demand was petitioned by the famous Cipayung Group, a loose grouping of nationalist and religious-based student organizations founded in 1972.
The law aims at clarifying issues such as requirements demanded from a presidential candidates and how many times an Indonesian president may be re-elected.
"Such law is unnecessary at the present because there is no regulation that explicitly requires it," said House member Achmad Roestandi.
Also meeting the students were faction chairman Aminullah Ibrahim and faction member Dadi Sukardi.
The demand for a law controlling the president usually re- emerges in the lead-up to a general election in the hope that it will be considered by the People's Consultative Assembly, which reviews political laws prior to the subsequent presidential election.
Critics say that the existing laws give too much power to the president, making other state institutions such as the House of Representatives unable to perform its supervisory functions.
The students also expressed their concern over the political crisis plaguing the minority Indonesian Party (PDI) after a government and military-backed ousted the democratically elected chief Megawati Soekarnoputri.
Aminullah rejected the students' proposition that the Armed Forces, which wields the famous "dual function" in both security and defense, should be neutral in handling state affairs.
He said that the military as the "dynamizer and stabilizer" force in the Indonesian political scene.
"If the Armed Forces chooses to be neutral, it would mean that the military should not do anything when it see people hack each other," he said.
Meanwhile, veteran student activists of the Exponen '66 in Surabaya expressed deep concern over recent political intrigues that culminated in massive last week's massive student-led demonstrations in the East Java capital.
Exponen '66 is a student group that played a pivotal role in the crushing of the Indonesian Communist Party (PKI) the emergence of the New Order administration under President Soeharto.
In a statement signed by nine activists, including Anton Priyatno and Mustahid Astari -- both are senior executives of the ruling political organization, Golkar -- they said the protests reminded them of agitation fueled by the PKI in 1965 when the party meant to seize power.
One of the signatories, Ismoe Handoko, said that anonymous pamphlets circulated following the July 8-9 labor strikes alleged that the "ally of the Armed Forces, capitalists and capitalists" killed up to two million people in the aftermath of the 1965 abortive coup that was blamed on PKI.
ABRI rounded up more than two dozen students leading the protests and has named three as suspects to be brought to trial on charges of instigating the demonstrations.
"We believe the protesters had the backing from discontent individuals who have powerful positions in the government, the Armed Forces. They may also have the support from retired military officers and some conglomerates. If not, how they dared to do it?" he said. (pan/27)