Megawati wins one, loses one in court
JAKARTA (JP): Megawati Soekarnoputri, the ousted leader of the Indonesian Democratic Party (PDI), won the right to continue one of her legal battles after the Supreme Court ruled she could sue her political rival, Soerjadi.
The court, however, also ruled she could not continue her lawsuit against the government, which she has accused of backing her ouster.
In a verdict dated Aug. 18, 1998, the Supreme Court said it accepted a High Court ruling that the lower Central Jakarta District Court had the authority to try her lawsuit against Soerjadi and organizers of the 1996 PDI congress in which she was toppled.
In the same verdict, the Supreme Court overturned the High Court's ruling that the same district court also had the authority to try her lawsuit against the government.
"The Central Jakarta District Court can now try Megawati's lawsuit against Soerjadi and organizers of the 1996 congress, but must not continue trying her lawsuit against the government," Secretary-General of the Supreme Court Pranowo told reporters yesterday.
The government in the case was represented by then minister of home affairs Moch. Yogie S.M., then Armed Forces commander Gen. (ret.) Feisal Tanjung and then National Police chief Gen. Dibyo Widodo.
Megawati was replaced by Soerjadi in a government-sponsored congress held in Medan, North Sumatra, in June 1996.
She responded by lodging hundreds of lawsuits challenging the validity of the congress and its results at various district courts nationwide.
Pranowo said the district court could proceed to try Megawati's lawsuit against Soerjadi because the latter was late in lodging his formal appeal against the suit. He said Soerjadi's lawyers had not been aware of the deadline for the appeal's submission.
Soerjadi announced he planned to appeal the lawsuit on Aug. 12, 1997, but the formal request reached the Supreme Court on Sept. 10, 1997.
Pranowo quoted Article 47 of Law No. 14/1985 on the Supreme Court, which stipulates that a formal request for an appeal to the court must be submitted within two weeks after an announcement of an appeal is made.
Pranowo supported the judges' ruling that the Central Jakarta District Court did not have the authority to try Megawati's lawsuit against the government.
The Supreme Court, chaired by Justice Soeharto, ruled that the government's support for the 1996 congress was part of its administrative duties. The district court, it said, did not have jurisdiction over administrative affairs.
"The government's decision to support the 1996 congress was for the interest of the country," Pranowo quoted the Supreme Court as ruling.
"It (support) was not against the law."
The chief of Megawati's team of defense lawyers, R.O. Tambunan, however, disagreed.
"How could they (the judges) say the government officials (supporting the congress) had not violated any laws when they were directly involved in PDI's internal affairs?" he asked.
"We have evidence that the congress participants were intimidated prior to their arrival to the congress venue in Medan," he told The Jakarta Post.
Similarly, Alex Litaay, the secretary-general of PDI under Megawati, said the Supreme Court had made a discriminatory ruling.
"If Soerjadi and the organizers of the congress can be prosecuted, then why can't the government officials?" he asked, adding that the 1945 Constitution said that every citizen should be treated equally before the law.
In a related development, over 150 Megawati supporters from Central Java yesterday announced that they planned to travel to Palu to "persuade" participants of an upcoming Soerjadi-led PDI congress to abandon the event.
"But we're not going to use violence," said Sukarman, a Megawati loyalist from Semarang. He also claimed the group was planning the trip on their own initiative. (imn/emf/har)