Impeachment seminar not until 1998

JAKARTA (JP): A controversial seminar on the impeachment of Indonesia's first president Sukarno will not be held until after next year's presidential election.

Minister/State Secretary Moerdiono told reporters yesterday the decision was made in view of the public reaction to the planned seminar.

Moerdiono said the rescheduling was deemed necessary because Indonesia faced two major political events in the next 12 months: the May general election and the People's Consultative Assembly session to elect the president in March next year. "They are very crucial events and should top our priorities," he said.

While there was no urgency, Moerdiono defended the plan to hold the seminar, "to explain to the young generation the political processes that decided this nation's fate".

The seminar, to discuss president Sukarno's last public speech, was originally planned for this month, before it drew sharp reactions.

In the speech, titled Nawaksara (nine points) and read before an emergency session of the Provisional People's Consultative Assembly (MPRS) in June 1966, Sukarno defended his administration and did not condemn the communist uprising in 1965. The MPRS rejected the speech and moved to impeach him.

Armed Forces chief spokesman Brig. Gen. Slamet Supriadi said the military supported the seminar to inform the public about what really happened during and after the affair.

He noted that President Soeharto has approved the plan.

Businessman Sofyan Wanandi, a former student leader who took part in the massive anti-Sukarno street protests in 1966, said the seminar should not proceed.

There is nothing more to discuss about the speech, Sofyan said. The seminar would only lead to polemics, he added.

"For me, it's already over, because the leadership change was constitutional. We have held five elections since then and nobody has questioned the New Order's legitimacy," he said.

Rather than holding a seminar, historians and witnesses should write a book if the intention is to give accurate information on what happened, he said.

Amien Rais, chairman of the Muhammadiyah Moslem organization, said the country should not waste time rebutting "a few people" who doubted the truth of the Nawaksara, Antara reported.

"We have to be careful when speaking about Sukarno as an individual and a former president," he said. "If necessary, the plan should be dropped."

"I fear that the seminar will only cause disunity among us," he said in Surakarta, Central Java. "Let the historic event belong to the past," he added. (amd/imn)