Gen. Edi backs establishment of 'new PNI'
JAKARTA (JP): Government officials have given qualified support to the establishment yesterday of a new organization called Indonesian National Unity (PNI).
"Let's just hope that it was established because the founders want to participate and feel responsible (for national development)," Minister of Defense Gen. (ret.) Edi Sudradjat said of the organization which was formally founded last night. "We have to think positively."
The acronym of the new organization is identical to that of the Partai Nasional Indonesia socialist-nationalist politically party, established in 1946, which was later merged with other parties to form the Indonesian Democratic Party (PDI) in 1973.
In the days before its establishment, people began referring to the proposed organization as the "new PNI".
About 200 people, including leading government critic Ali Sadikin, attended the inauguration of the organization yesterday.
Former diplomat Supeni was elected chairwoman. Her five deputies include Djathi Koesoemo, a PDI legislator.
Another of the deputies, Sutan Ali Asli, called on the public yesterday not to associate the new organization with the PNI political party.
In her speech, Supeni said the organization wants to address the questions of moral decadence, corruption, public unrest and a host of other issues that have been neglected by government officials.
The PNI will strive to strengthen nationalism, she said. "We want to establish unity and to cooperate with various groups, as long as they are based on the state ideology Pancasila," she said.
Other figures involved in the PNI are former minister of home affairs Sanusi Hardjadinata; Usep Ranuwijaya, a professor at the private-owned 17 August University; and Berar Fathia, who announced herself a candidate for the national presidency prior to the 1992 presidential election.
"I don't know whether this PNI will be another form of the old PNI, but it's better for us to see its establishment as participation in the national life," Edi said.
Another new organization is the National Brotherhood Foundation, recently founded by 67 influential public figures, including former House Speaker Kharis Suhud and former chief of social and political affairs of the Armed Forces Bambang Triantoro.
Coordinating Minister for Political Affairs and Security Soesilo Soedarman called on the public yesterday not to draw connections between the widely-publicized birth of the foundation and "the current political situation".
The founders "are old people who want only peace before they die," he said.
"They are idealistic old soldiers who want to uphold the morality of the nation. They want to die peacefully...Let them be. Do we need to prohibit them?" he asked.
Chief of the State Intelligence Coordinating Body Lt. Gen. Soedibyo welcomed the birth of both new organizations. "But let's wait and see what their programs are," he added.
Political observer Purwoko of Diponegoro University in Semarang, Central Java, told The Jakarta Post yesterday that the new foundation was nothing more than a vehicle for certain interest groups to garner support for themselves ahead of the 1997 general elections. (anr/swe/har)