Government forms crisis controlling agency

JAKARTA (JP): President Abdurrahman Wahid and Vice President Megawati Soekarnoputri will jointly lead a crisis controlling agency which will be responsible for analyzing all problems related to security and political affairs in the country, a minister said.

The agency, whose name remained undisclosed, will start operating on Monday.

"This is an agency, which directly falls under the President and serves to help analyze actual security conditions," Coordinating Minister for Political, Social and Security Affairs Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono said on Sunday.

Comprising several ministers and senior officials, the agency has the main job of providing the President with various options for decisions in response to certain security conditions.

"The agency does not have any line of command at all. It was formed to prevent the President from making hasty decisions," Susilo said.

He added that the agency is neither an independent nor an ad- hoc body.

The new agency will be placed at the coordinating ministry of political, social and security affairs office with Susilo as the caretaker.

Susilo dismissed speculation that the agency would follow in the footsteps of the now defunct military-controlled Coordinating Agency to Support the Strengthening of National Stability (Bakorstanas).

Bakorstanas was formed based on the 1988 presidential decree, which stipulated that the nonstructural agency was assigned to coordinate ministries and other government institutions to develop national stability, and to collect information on the emergence of obstacles and challenges to national stability.

Earlier last year, in a bid to uphold civil supremacy, Abdurrahman disbanded the agency saying that it had caused too much trouble in the country. (dja)