Deputy governor quizzed over diploma
Apriadi Gunawan, The Jakarta Post, Medan
The North Sumatra provincial council's plenary meeting had to be postponed following tension among council members demanding that Deputy Governor Rudolf Pardede give an explanation about the validity of his high school diploma, which some have alleged to be a fake.
The meeting, which was supposed to hear each of the factions' final responses over the 2004 provincial budget spending, went on for five hours before it was agreed that it would be postponed until Sept. 28.
The council's speaker, Abdul Wahab Dalimunte said the meeting had to be postponed to cool off the situation as the tension was making it impossible for the meeting to go on.
The tension started when several factions, such as the Prosperous Justice Party (PKS) and Reform Star Party (PBR), questioned the legality of the deputy governor's diploma.
The two factions objected when the meeting's schedule included a speech by Rudolf on behalf of late governor Rizal Nurdin. They argued that if he were allowed to deliver the speech, it meant the council had tacitly agreed on his appointment as acting governor.
The council has not yet discussed who should be appointed as acting governor since the governor's term was to end in three years.
Chairman of the PKS faction, Sigit Pramono Asri, said that his faction rejected Rudolf because he was still a suspect in the case of an alleged fake diploma. He said Rudolf was named a suspect in the case by the police two years ago and his status had not changed.
Chairman of the PBR faction, Muhammad Rade Syafi'i, said that he did not deny that Rudolf, based on Law 32/2004 on local administrations, should be next in line to become governor.
However, Rudolf should be able to properly explain the legality of his diploma.
"If it (the clarification) is not done, then Rudolf's leadership would not be effective and can obstruct the province's development," he said.
Following the death of governor Rizal Nurdin in the tragic Mandala crash in Medan, protesters flooded the streets to express their rejection of Rudolf as acting governor.
On Monday, protesters claiming to be from the North Sumatra People's Front for Justice staged a protest outside the provincial council, but they were prevented by the police from entering the building.
Apart from rejecting Rudolf, the protesters also demanded that President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono set a date to hold direct elections for a new governor and deputy governor.
The North Sumatra police on Friday declared that it would follow up the investigation into Rudolf's alleged fake diploma and that they had already sent a team of four officers to West Java town of Sukabumi to investigate the case.
Chief of North Sumatra Police, Insp. Gen. Iwan Pandjiwinata, urged people to be patient and wait for the investigation to conclude.
"The police are still investigating the case of the alleged fake diploma and I hope people will wait for its result," Iwan said.
The case first emerged when Rudolf failed to include his high school diploma as he was about to run for deputy governor two years ago. Instead of including his diploma, Rudolf only included a piece of a paper, which stated that he studied at SMUK BPK Penabur high school in Sukabumi.
The story surfaced when the school's principal Martha Christiawati, whose name was the letter, retracted her statement and reportedly said in another letter, given to Nusantara Corruption Watch, that the school had never had a student by the name of Rudolf Pardede.