Golkar's Jakarta chapter to elect new chairman
Golkar's Jakarta chapter to elect new chairman
JAKARTA (JP): Golkar's Jakarta chapter announced yesterday
that it plans to hold a two-day regional congress next week to
elect a new chairman for the 1998/2000 period, the chapter
chairman said yesterday.
Serving chairman Tadjus Sobirin, who was included on a list of
nine candidates for the new chairmanship, said the congress was
scheduled to start on Aug. 28.
"I'm ready to contest the election with the other candidates,"
he added.
He will line up against Sugeng Suprijatna and Ade Surapriatna,
both city council deputy speakers, former deputy governor for
development affairs TB.M. Rais, deputy governor for
administrative affairs Abdul Kahfi, head of the council's Armed
Forces (ABRI) faction Sumekar K.W., ABRI faction member Dudi
Sugiandi, Asmawi Manaf, a member of the executive board of the
Golkar's Jakarta chapter, and Ahmadi, a former head of Golkar's
Jakarta chapter.
The nomination of Kahfi, Sumekar and Dudi was strongly
criticized by Golkar cadre Amir Hamzah on the grounds that all
three were serving members of the Armed Forces.
Amir said that serving Armed Forces personnel were prohibited
from leading Golkar which meant that if one of the trio was
successful in the election then he would have to resign from the
Armed Forces. "But I do not think there would enough time to
process any such move and so they should be excluded from the
list," he added.
Meanwhile, Golkar's factional head in the City Council,
Fatommy Asaari, said yesterday that Golkar could only expect to
gain about 25 percent of votes in the capital in next year's
general election, a sharp drop from the 57 percent it recorded
last year.
He added that even reaching this humble target would not be an
easy task because Golkar's name had become closely linked with
corruption, collusion and nepotism. He was speaking from a
special event to mark the 53rd anniversary of Indonesian
independence at Golkar's Jakarta chapter headquarters in Central
Jakarta.
To mark yesterday's anniversary Golkar sold poor people 1,000
packages of food containing rice, cooking oil and sugar for Rp
7,500 each.
Fatommy said that Jakartans were now more critical of
politicians because news of their illicit practices was now
reported frequently and with impunity by the mass media.
"That's why it will be difficult to get votes in the election
unless Golkar members work hard (to end these practices)," he
said, refusing to identify those in his faction who are currently
involved in malfeasance.
The capital had 7.45 million eligible voters in the 1997
election, 65 percent (4.45 million) of whom voted for Golkar. The
United Development Party (PPP) came second with 32.3 percent
(2.24 million) of the votes while the Indonesian Democratic Party
(PDI) won the support of a mere 1.7 percent of the capital's
electorate. (ind)