Chairul elected new boss of PBSI
Novan Iman Santosa, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta
After several heated arguments and failing earlier in the evening to elect a chairman, the Badminton Association of Indonesia (PBSI) elected businessman Chairul Tanjung at about 10:40 p.m. Saturday night.
The election should have started at 7:30 pm but the participants were divided on how to do the elections.
When thr voting finally began, Chairul ended up winning by a landslide vote of 252 votes against Justian Suhandinata's 13 votes.
The congress started on Friday and is scheduled to end on Sunday at Hotel Indonesia, Central Jakarta.
Participants from the Jakarta chapter demanded it to be done secretly in a ballot room while the majority preferred it to be done openly.
The election was marred by an incident when participants from Jakarta chapter and its five branches decided to walk out of the venue over a heated argument over whether the election should be done openly or secretly.
Before the congress participants voted, 20 PBSI chapters have openly expressed their support for Chairul to be the next chairman replacing the incumbent Subagyo Hadisiswoyo who had announced his refusal for renomination.
The other candidate, Justian, got support from Jakarta, Lampung, Irian Jaya, East Nusa Tenggara and North Sulawesi.
Meanwhile, four other chapters of Aceh, Bengkulu, Riau and South Kalimantan did not state their support openly.
The chapters expressed their support during their evaluation of the performance of Subagyo's 1997-2001 period.
Most of the chapters said they were satisfied with Subagyo's achievements while pointing out some weaknesses to be remedied by the next chairman.
Subagyo admitted that there were several shortcomings, such as the failure to groom the women shuttlers and failure to send more shuttlers abroad.
But he put the blame on the condition during his tenure in which the rupiah was extremely weakened against the U.S. dollar.
"I started the job with Rp 2,500 against a dollar but suddenly it rocketed to some Rp 15,000," he told the participants.
"But on the other hand, we managed to have the Thomas Cup twice in 1998 and 2000. We also continued our gold medal tradition at the Sydney Olympics."
"And we also have two world champion titles with all the financial shortages," he continued.
Separately in Bung Karno Badminton Stadium, all national shuttlers from the Indonesian Badminton Center (PBI) have ensured four titles by filling all final berths except for the men's singles title.
The only outsider was Taufik Hidayat, who is a member of the elite training camp, now representing West Java chapter after resigning from PBI over a dispute about his participation in the Danish Open.
Seeded first here, Taufik defeated his former team mate, second stringer Rony Agustinus 7-3, 7-5, 7-4 showing that he is still an asset for Indonesia's badminton society.
Taufik will then see junior Sony Dwi Kuncoro who beat team mate Anggun Nugroho 7-0, 8-6, 7-2.
Sony is actually still in the junior division but PBSI decided to play all of its national junior shuttlers to play in the senior division.
In the women's singles, second seed Yuli Marfuah of West Java was the only upset when junior shuttler Dian Novita took a 7-4, 7-3, 7-0 victory.
Dian will now challenge top seed Atu Rosalina who beat another junior Silvi Antarini 7-4 7-3, 0-7, 7-3.
Top seeds Candra Wijaya and Sigit Budiarto will face teammates Nova Widhianto and Bambang Suprianto who are seeded second in the men's doubles while Emma Ermawati and Eny Widiowati will challenge top seeds Minarti Timur and Vita Marissa in the women's doubles.
Bambang will team up with Emma in the mixed doubles to face Tri Kusheryanto who will pair up with Vita.