Army urges Gus Dur not to disband DPR

JAKARTA (JP): Army Chief of Staff Gen. Endriartono Sutarto warned President Abdurrahman Wahid on Wednesday not to disband the House of Representatives, which over past months has been at loggerheads with the embattled President.

"We ask him not to do it since it is against democracy," Endriartono said at Army headquarters here.

"Issuing a decree (to disband the House) will only worsen the already poor relationship between the President and the House," he added.

Endriartono was responding to speculation which has spread since the weekend, claiming that Abdurrahman plans to dissolve the House.

He was quick to add, however, that the Army would remain loyal to the President and that the military would not join the President's rivals in calling for his resignation.

"We have no right to do that," Endriartono said.

Abdurrahman flatly denied later in the day that he had any intention of dissolving the House.

"There is no such thing ... that decree is only according to what people say and if you believe it then it's your own fault," Abdurrahman said at Bina Graha presidential office.

Reports have emerged that, during a breakfast meeting with military brass on Saturday, the President proposed he would dissolve the House through a presidential decree.

The idea, however, was immediately rejected by Endriartono, who was present at the meeting along with Navy Chief of Staff Adm. Indroko Sastrowiryono and Air Force Chief of Staff Marshal Hanafie Asnan.

Abdurrahman also charged earlier on Wednesday that some legislators were trying to make the House superior to the executive branch of government and vowed to fight them.

"The current wish of some people to elevate the House above the executive is a wish that should be fought against because it violates the Constitution," he told a seminar organized by the National Resilience Institute.

"If the president allows this to take place, then he has acted against the Constitution and there is nothing else to do for him but to resign," Abdurrahman continued.

Rumors that the President would dissolve the House also triggered a rebuke from House Speaker Akbar Tandjung on Wednesday.

He said the House would immediately call on the People's Consultative Assembly (MPR) to convene a special session to impeach the President if the latter issued such a decree.

"It will be an authoritarian and unconstitutional action if the President issues a decree to dissolve the legislature. We, therefore, will resist," he said.

He said that the Constitution does not allow the president to dissolve the legislative body and the Assembly could use such an action to justify the convening of a special session to impeach the president.

"According to the Constitution, the president cannot dissolve the House, and vice versa, because of their equal position in the state system," he said.

Many have suggested that rumors of Abdurrahman's plan to dissolve the House are only a tactic being used by the President for negotiation leverage.

The outlook of Abdurrahman's political survival has become increasingly bleak following the House's issuance of a second memorandum of censure against him on April 30.

The President has until the end of this month to respond to the second censure.

Separately, constitutional law expert Harun Al Rasyid said that, while he does not personally agree with the need to issue such a decree, theoretically the president has the authority to do so.

He argued that, apart from powers explicitly stipulated in the 1945 Constitution and other laws, the president also has the unwritten prerogative to act in situations which are deemed as an emergency, such as during the time of first president Sukarno.

However, Harun said that the current situation could not be deemed an emergency that would warrant the issuance of such a decree.

Many have argued that the precedent for such a decree is a 1959 decree issued by Sukarno which at the time dissolved the constituent assembly. (02/byg/rms)