Gus Dur for president: PKB

PURWOKERTO: The National Awakening Party (PKB) will nominate former president Abdurrahman Wahid, or Gus Dur as he is popularly known, its candidate in the 2004 general election, party chairman Alwi Shihab said Monday.

According to Alwi, all party leaders had agreed to appoint Gus Dur as their standard bearer in 2004, when the country will hold its first ever direct presidential election.

Gus Dur, one of the party's founders in 1999, was impeached by members of the People's Consultative Assembly (MPR) in 2001 for incompetence.

"We have no other alternative at this moment. The only presidential candidate from PKB is Gus Dur," Alwi said at the Islamic boarding school al-Hidayah Karangsuci, Purwokerto, Central Java.

Gus Dur, according to Alwi, had given positive response to the plan. "He leaves the decision to the party," he said.

He also said that he would soon recall legislators who were no longer loyal to the party's platform.

"We fully agree with the law and we will call our members who are considered no longer loyal to the party," he said, referring to the newly endorsed bill on the composition of MPR, the House of Representatives (DPR), and the Regional Representatives Council (DPD), which allows parties to recall legislators from the House. --JP