Govt mulls giving houses to Habibie and Gus Dur

Fabiola Desy Unidjaja, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

The government is currently arranging the granting of houses for former president Abdurrahman Wahid and his predecessor B.J. Habibie in accordance with Law No. 7/1978.

The state secretary's administration deputy Rildo Ananda Anwar said on Friday that the state had the obligation to provide appropriate residences for all former presidents and vice presidents.

Rildo said that Habibie would be allowed to retain the house in the plush area of Patra Kuningan, South Jakarta, where he lived when he was vice president in 1998. Habibie is now living in Germany with his ailing wife.

Abdurrahman lives in his private residence in the South Jakarta suburb of Ciganjur.

"We are completing the administrative requirements for the transfer of Habibie's house as the building currently belongs to the state-owned oil company, Pertamina," Rildo told The Jakarta Post and Koran Tempo.

However, he refused to disclose the value of the house. The market price of homes in this area is over Rp 5 billion (US$550,000).

Rildo said, however, that Abdurrahman's family had expressed the wish to receive their entitlement in kind.

"Abdurrahman's family said that they already had a house, so we are still considering whether it will be possible to provide them with the equivalent value in money," he added.

Law No.7/1978 obligates the state to provide appropriate houses and cars for every former president and vice president.

However, this policy has drawn criticism since the fall of former President Soeharto from office.

Habibie, who replaced Soeharto, agreed to provide him with a Rp 27 billion (US$3million) house in Taman Mini, East Jakarta, but the public demanded that the decision be revoked.

Due to the controversy, Soeharto returned the money to the state, Rildo said.

He further said that the government was mulling the issuance of a new government regulation to set limits and conditions for the provision of such benefits to former VIPs.

"There should be a clear standard on the value of the house and an additional regulation that allows the state to pay a certain amount of money equivalent to the value of the house price if the former VIP family refuses to accept the property," Rildo said.

Deputy Cabinet Secretary Erman Radjagukguk said that such a regulation had been discussed over the past year. It would regulate all benefits and allowances provided by the state for former VIPs, he said.

"However, we are not prioritizing the regulation as there many other draft regulations that need to be completed soon," Erman told the Post.

He stressed that the regulation would set a limit on the value of the houses granted to former VIPs, and other details in implementation of Law No. 7/1978.