Attorney General arms his staff with rattan sticks

JAKARTA (JP): Attorney General Andi M. Ghalib presented hundreds of his staff with rattan sticks on Friday saying they were needed to fend off "radical groups" who might stage protests at his office.

"This is not aimed at provoking tension. We need to protect ourselves and our office from radical groups who tend to damage, loot and burn things," Ghalib told hundreds of his subordinates during a roll call at his office.

He did not identify who those radical groups were, but said that they were present among hundreds of protesting students who camped out in the Attorney General's Office backyard in November.

"From now on, we should train ourselves and be ready to face that kind of situation," said the three-star Army general, adding that other government offices should follow his move.

He named Deputy Attorney General for Intelligence Syamsu Djalaludin, who is formerly chief of the Military Police, as commandant of the rattan stick-wielding brigade.

Other deputy attorney generals would be named "battalion commanders" while lower-ranking officials would be company, platoon and group leaders respectively.

"This does not mean that we want to be like the military, but the units in the military are the easiest things for us to copy," he said.

He told his subordinates that they must always have their one- meter long sticks with them whenever emergency situations break out, gather at predetermined locations in the complex and wait for further instructions.

"We have to be ready for a worst-case scenario," he said.

When pressed why the responsibility of maintaining security and order at his office was put on the employees instead of security personnel, Ghalib told reporters that the security personnel were outnumbered by far by the protesters during the demonstrations.

"Moreover, sometimes they were needed at other locations," Ghalib said.

Disappointed and angry students managed to enter his office and presented a black hen to Ghalib and called him a coward in the November protest when he persistently refused to set a deadline for the investigation into the wealth of former president Soeharto.

Students have been demanding that Soeharto be tried for alleged abuses of power and amassing an illegal fortune during his 32 year-rule.

Since then, dozens of troops and Mobile Brigade personnel have been stationed at the office.

During the past week, workers were also seen preparing and finishing a number of barbed wire barricades around the Attorney General's Office building.

The probe into Soeharto's wealth has dragged on since June and come under fire from legal experts and pro-reformists who have accused Ghalib of deliberate foot-dragging. (byg)