Government approves PDI's rival congress

Government approves PDI's rival congress

JAKARTA (JP): After repeated statements of a hands-off policy
in connection with leadership wrangling in the minority
Indonesian Democratic Party (PDI), the government yesterday
endorsed a request from the party's rival board for permission to
hold a fresh chairmanship election.

"The majority of the party's members have requested permission
to convene a congress. The government should not reject the
majority's request," Home Affairs Ministry Director General of
Sociopolitics Sutoyo N.K. told reporters after receiving a
delegation of some activists of the rival board yesterday.

"Since the beginning, the government has observed that PDI is
still absorbed in internal problems," he said. "The government
would accept any offer to solve the problems, as long as they are
in line with the party's constitution and statutes."

Some 40 PDI members came to the Ministry of Home Affairs
yesterday, proposing a congress to solve rifts in the party.

"The last national meeting left some unfinished business that
is disturbing the party's activities," said Buttu Hutapea, the
spokesperson of the North Sumatra chapter of PDI.

The meeting he referred to was the disputed extraordinary
congress in Surabaya, East Java, in December 1993. At the
congress, Megawati won the majority of votes of the party's
regional branches. The result was legalized in a national
"deliberation" meeting in January 1994.

Among the unfinished business that Buttu mentioned was the
failure of the current central executive board to establish the
Central Supervisory Board and Party's Supervisory Council. The
central board also failed to solve the leadership rift in the
East Java chapter, he said.

"The solutions can only be achieved through a congress," Buttu
said, adding that most of the chapters supported the call for a
convening of the congress.

The group claimed yesterday they were representing 21 of 27
provincial chapters and 215 of 305 branches of PDI.

Secretary-general Alexander Litaay of Megawati's board
yesterday criticized the government's decision. "It's not helping
PDI resolve its problems. The government shouldn't have made such
a hasty decision," he said.

"The government should have checked whether those people
represented the majority of PDI's members," he said.

The government has repeatedly stated that it supported
Megawati as the only legitimate leader of the party.

Separately, PDI's Deputy House Speaker, Soerjadi, said he
supported the proposal and added that Megawati should also agree
with it.

Soerjadi, whom Megawati defeated in the party's 1993 election,
said there has not been any congress held to legalize the results
of 1993's national meeting. According to the statutes, decisions
taken in the meeting should be approved by a national-scale
congress first, he pointed out.

"Megawati's board has no right to claim itself as the
sanctioned board with a five-year tenure," he added. (01/imn)