Mrs. Rukmana gets volleyball chair

Mrs. Rukmana gets volleyball chair

JAKARTA (JP): The national congress of the Indonesian Volleyball Association yesterday afternoon unanimously elected prominent businesswoman and daughter of President Soeharto, Siti Hardijanti Rukmana, its new chairperson.

If she accepts the decision, she will replace Gen. (ret) Kunarto, who nominated her for the post on the first day of a national congress held by the association in Sentul, West Java, on Monday.

Mrs. Rukmana, widely known as Mbak Tutut, was scheduled to arrived here late last night from London. Several officials from the association were to escort her to Sentul, where she was expected to respond to the mounting support.

The two-day congress was officially closed yesterday.

She had been scheduled to arrive in Sentul from London by the time the association formally elected her at about 2 p.m. yesterday. However, according to Kunarto, who contacted her by phone, she was still in Abu Dhabi, the United Arab Emirates, on the way to Jakarta at that time.

Kunarto asked the congress to wait for her. He also sent Rita Subowo, chairperson of the Indonesian Beach Volleyball Association, to the Halim Perdanakusuma airport to formally get her response and to take her to Sentul, if she was not too tired to attend the congress.

Kunarto said: "We must understand should she may be unable to be with us tonight. She would not hesitate to come here, I believe, if she was not too tired after the long journey."

Another decision made by the congress yesterday was a structural change in the association. The post of executive director, whose job is to oversee the association's activities on a day-to-day basis, was removed from the organizational chart.

The new structure is topped by the chairperson, followed by vice chairperson, chairperson of the association's advisory council, director for organizational affairs, training director, finance and logistics director and director for international affairs.

The congress also agreed that as the new chairperson, Mrs. Rukmana would be responsible for forming her "cabinet". This means that she is free to pick the people to fill the posts offered by the new organizational structure, with only one exception. The chairman for the association's advisory council must be Gen. Banurusman, the chief of the National Police.

Indramadji of the association's Jakarta chapter said this exception was made in order to facilitate the supervision of the association's 26 provincial chapters, 22 of which are chaired by provincial police chiefs. (arf)