House wants TNI under defense ministry
Kurniawan Hari, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta
The powerful Indonesian Military (TNI) is likely to remain under the control of the president, with most factions in the House of Representatives (DPR) saying they wanted to maintain the status quo on Thursday.
Only the National Awakening Party (PKB) faction insisted on proposing the TNI be placed under the control of the defense ministry in order to further strengthen the supremacy of the civilian administration.
PKB faction spokesman Effendi Choirie said putting the TNI under the supervision of the Ministry of Defense would uphold the principle of civil supremacy.
The PKB's stance on this issue has been backed by pro- democracy and human rights groups.
Other factions and the government said the TNI should continue to remain under presidential control. However, there was disagreement over whether the military's administrative and strategic affairs should be coordinated by the defense ministry.
The disagreement prompted lawmakers deliberating the controversial TNI bill to bring the issue to a closed-door meeting on Thursday for lobbying.
The Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P), the leader of the largest faction in the House, argued the deployment of military forces should remain under the control of the president as the supreme commander.
"The TNI's management, organization, strategy and administration, however, should be under coordination of the defense ministry," PDI-P faction spokesman Ahmad Baskara said.
Golkar Party faction spokesman Hajriyanto Y. Thohari agreed the TNI should remain under the president, but called for the Ministry of Defense's coordination role to be made clearer.
The United Development Party (PPP), the National Mandate Party, the Prosperous Justice Party, the Crescent Star Party and the TNI/Police faction, and the government also backed the proposal of the PDI-P led by President Megawati Soekarnoputri.
"We will not insist on asking the House factions to accept our idea. We agree with the PDI-P faction's proposal," said TNI commander Gen. Endriartono Sutarto who was involved in the bill's deliberation.
The TNI's position in the state administration is one of the crucial issues arising in the government-sponsored TNI bill.
Defense and military analysts have recommended the TNI be put under the defense ministry's control to avoid overlapping in policy-making.
Currently, the TNI is directly subordinate to the president, while the TNI chief has the same status as a cabinet minister. The chief is entitled to attend Cabinet sessions and those held by the office of the coordinating minister for political and security affairs.
Analysts say this arrangement has often created overlaps in policy-making between the TNI headquarters and the Ministry of Defense.
The arrangement meant the TNI leadership could reject the Ministry of Defense bill on the military and draft its own bill.
Another contentious issue was the inclusion of the TNI's territorial function in Article 1 of the bill, which has widely been rejected by human rights and prodemocracy groups. Activists say the function, which stations military personnel throughout the country in posts at every level of civilian administration, has been abused by soldiers who were using their offices to run illegal operations.
The proposal made by the TNI/Police faction was also rejected by the PKB. Other factions called for a clearer definition of which territorial affairs would be managed by the military.
The TNI/Police faction says the TNI's territorial function should be defined as managing human and national resources as a force to support the military's main defense role.
The contention also prompted lawmakers to bring this article to a closed-door meeting.