Akbar wins full backing of party board
Akbar wins full backing of party board
Kurniawan Hari, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta
Golkar's presidential convention will not take place until
Tuesday, but Akbar Tandjung has already secured the full backing
of the party's Central Executive Board (DPP).
Six days before party leaders and other members pick their
flag-bearer for the July 5 direct presidential election, the DPP
jumped the gun on Thursday and announced they would back Akbar.
"We have agreed to vote for Akbar during the convention
because he has been able to increase our party's votes (in the
legislative election)," party deputy leader Mahadi Sinambela
announced on Thursday.
Golkar, the political machine of former autocrat Soeharto, is
leading the provisional tally of votes in the April 5 legislative
election. With some 70 percent of the vote counted, Golkar has
20.96 percent of the votes, just ahead of the Indonesian
Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P) at 19.73 percent.
The DPP's backing, however, does not necessarily mean a win in
the April 20 presidential convention, which has six presidential
hopefuls vying for the top spot, but it could influence the vote
of undecided members.
Under convention rules, the Golkar DPP accounts for just 18
votes, while regental branches (DPD II) and provincial chapters
account for 440 and 96 votes respectively.
Mahadi admitted that the DPP support would not automatically
guarantee a win for Akbar, but stressed that fellow party leaders
wanted Akbar to defeat other candidates -- former military chief
Gen. (ret) Wiranto, media baron Surya Paloh, former Army
Strategic Reserves (Kostrad) commander Lt. Gen. (ret) Prabowo
Subianto, businessman Aburizal Bakrie and Coordinating Minister
for People's Welfare Jusuf Kalla.
The result of the preconvention series last October ended with
Aburizal ranked first, followed by Surya, Wiranto, Akbar, Kalla,
Prabowo and Yogyakarta Governor Sultan Hamengkubuwono X, who quit
the race shortly after the Supreme Court overturned Akbar's
corruption conviction in February.
Some party leaders insinuated that the regental branches and
provincial chapters had backed away from Akbar because of his
corruption conviction, which was still on appeal to the Supreme
Court at that time.
Meanwhile, convention chairman Slamet Effendy Yusuf said on
Thursday that committee members were still discussing whether to
extend the convention to a second round of voting or not.
He also explained some of the steering committee's curious
regulations for the actual vote. One was that they could not take
cameras into the voting booth, "because it could compromise
secrecy".
However, the committee requires that regental and provincial
chapter delegates be accompanied by their chapter chiefs inside
the polling booth to make sure they vote the right way.
"It is designed to keep the mandate of the regional chapters.
The policies are designed to prevent money politics," he
explained.
Slamet emphasized that all six presidential candidates had
committed to supporting the Golkar Party, regardless of the
Tuesday's outcome.
He said that all candidates had agreed that they would not
accept offers from other political parties to become their
presidential candidates should they lose on Tuesday.
However, any of Golkar's presidential candidates may accept an
offer from other parties to become the running mate of another
presidential candidate.