Harjono takes top Ikadin post again

Harjono takes top Ikadin post again

YOGYAKARTA (JP): Incumbent chairman Harjono Tjitrosoebono was
re-elected yesterday to lead the Indonesian Bar Association
(Ikadin) for a third consecutive five-year term.

There were no fistfights this time around, in contrast with
the last election five years ago, but the Ikadin congress still
left many delegates with a feeling of bitterness.

As the congress closed, some delegates were calling for the
expulsion of Todung Mulya Lubis, Harjono's closest rival in the
race, for his remarks denouncing the congress as "undemocratic".

The election's outcome was already determined on Thursday when
the congress insisted that any candidate must have served in an
executive position and have practiced as a lawyer for 10 years.

This precluded Mulya from running for the chairmanship.

Thus, yesterday's election was a mere formality. Harjono won
167 votes, well ahead of other candidates Djohan Djauhari, who
garnered 139 votes, and Maruli Simorangkir, who gained 91 votes.
Djohan had served as secretary-general on the outgoing Ikadin
executive board and Maruli was its deputy chairman.

The plenary session for the election was led by Maruli, who
was the chairman of the steering committee. All the 30 branches
of Ikadin were represented in the election.

Ikadin's in-house rules originally should have precluded
Harjono's re-election, since they state that a chairman can only
serve for one five-year term. However, the congress agreed to
disregard that rule.

Harjono's reelection is in defiance of the government's recent
call for Ikadin to "rejuvenate" its leadership. Harjono, 71 years
old, has been credited with maintaining Ikadin's independence
from the government.

"I am emotionally touched by the congress' confidence in me to
lead Ikadin once again," Harjono said after his reelection. "The
congress has been run in a democratic fashion. No one comes out a
winner or a loser," he added.

He called on all parties not to harbor ill feelings in spite
of the fierce contest in the election.

The tone of some of the other delegates to the congress was
far less conciliatory.

Henry Yosodiningrat and Tumbu Saraswati, two respected Jakarta
lawyers, said Mulya had denigrated the good name of Ikadin when
he called the congress "undemocratic".

Tumbu, who heads Ikadin's South Jakarta chapter, where Mulya
is registered, said she would summon Mulya and reprimand him. She
said she might even dismiss him from the lawyers' organization.

A clearly angry Mulya called a press conference on Thursday to
announce the withdrawal of his candidacy in the election, which
he said was a farce.

Mulya said his opponents had resorted to cheap tricks by
describing him as a government candidate or alleging that he was
buying votes.

"The climate in Ikadin is not healthy. Democratic values have
been defeated to serve the interests of a certain group and
ambitious individuals," Mulya said.

Other delegates, meanwhile, called on Harjono to heed the
appeals to rejuvenate Ikadin's leadership.

"Harjono has been validly and democratically been elected.
There was no outside pressure during the congress," Luhut M.P.
Pangaribuan, chairman of the Jakarta Legal Aid Institute, told
The Jakarta Post.

Luhut said, however, that Ikadin needs to have new blood and
that the congress had failed to infuse it.

He also suggested that, besides including younger lawyers on
the new board, Harjono should also recruit women to the board.

In his inauguration speech after the election, Harjono
outlined some of the programs he plans to carry out.

One of these is to prepare Indonesian lawyers to deal with the
trade liberalization moves which would allow foreign lawyers to
compete on Indonesian soil. "We need to protect our members from
a foreign lawyers' invasion," he said. (02/har/imn)