Ministers should deal with crisis

Ministers should deal with crisis

From Media Indonesia

Political-party figures are divided in their view whether
ministers should be allowed to campaign. I think ministers should
be prohibited from campaigning on the basis of the following
considerations.

1. If the ministers campaign, they are compelled to take leave.
Our country is in a crisis and there is very much work to be
accomplished by the ministers in a short time.

I cannot imagine the situation between May 18 and June 6, when
a number of ministers leave their posts only because of party
interest. It is not easy to delegate the task of the ministers to
other ministers or to their staff. The main thing is that general
interests must prevail over party or personal interests.

2. The general election should be honest and fair. If ministers
are allowed to campaign, it is feared this will eliminate
fairness because the ministers belong to three political parties,
while the other 45 never participated in the previous elections
and are, thus, not represented in the Cabinet. Let us all become
new players and start from the beginning together.

3. The general election committee (KPU) has to finish a lot of
work before the election campaigns in less than two months. The
ministers should not campaign, so the KPU is not additionally
burdened to make regulations for campaigning ministers.

It is true that the KPU cannot prohibit ministers from
campaigning, but the KPU is in a position to compel political
parties that they prohibit their cadres who are ministers from
campaigning.

However, I agree if ministers campaign after the 1999 general
election because:

1. It is fitting that the ministers go on leave after years of
service.

2. A sense of fairness will have been obtained because the
ministers will be the product of the general election with 48
political parties participating.

3. The KPU will have sufficient time to set the limits for
ministers campaigning.

M. GANDHI

Tangerang, West Java