NU chairman urges Megawati, Hamzah to quit party posts
The Jakarta Post, Jakarta
Nahdlatul Ulama (NU) chairman, Hasyim Muzadi, added to the mounting public pressure on Monday on top state officials to relinquish their respective party posts.
Speaking in a visit to a Muslim boarding school run by NU in the West Nusa Tenggara capital of Mataram, Hasyim said it would set a good precedent if President Megawati Soekarnoputri and Vice President Hamzah Haz quit as chiefs of their respective political parties.
"It would be good if the President and Vice President relinquish their chairmanship of their political parties as NU has been practicing within its organization," Hasyim said as quoted by Antara while visiting the Manhalul Ma'arif Islamic Boarding School at Darek village.
"If the President comes to an area for her political party's activities, people of other political parties will feel alienated from the President," he added.
Hasyim was referring to the recent decision by both the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI Perjuangan) and the United Development Party (PPP) to maintain Megawati and Hamzah as party leaders despite strong public demand for state or government officials to quit their positions in their political parties in an attempt to avoid a conflict of interests.
Officials from PDI Perjuangan and PPP had said that they still needed Megawati and Hamzah as their leaders due to their parties' internal policies. Other major parties, including Golkar, the National Mandate Party and the Crescent Star Party have followed suit.
Many believe the parties' resistance to public pressure has a lot to do with their preparations for the 2004 general election.
The National Resilience Institute (Lemhannas), known as the military think tank, has proposed the termination of the dual role to the government, but has received no response.
A conflict of interest resulting from the dual role, according to the institute, would hamper the government's efforts to lead the country out of the protracted crisis.
Hasyim said that NU had pioneered the principle of monoloyalty that has been applied in all levels of the organization's structure since last month.
Last week, former state minister of women's empowerment Khofifah Indar Parawansa and politician Maria Ulfah opted to quit their posts in the National Awakening Party (PKB) in order to maintain their role in NU's women's organizations.
NU, the country's largest Muslim organization, returned to its founding statute as a social organization in 1984 when it was chaired by Abdurrahman Wahid. It was Abdurrahman himself, however, who brought NU back into politics when he and other noted figures of the organization formed PKB in July 1998. Abdurrahman was elected president after the 1999 general election.
Now that Abdurrahman is no longer in power, NU under Hasyim is trying to distance itself from politics and PKB.
Hasyim said on Monday that NU, smarting from past experience, had renewed its commitment to mingle with people in society regardless of their different backgrounds.
NU, he said, would play an influential role in promoting religious harmony and building of the state.
"We had the capability but we were not smart enough to execute it," he said, adding that under his tenure between 1999 and 2004, NU would move to obtain its objectives.
NU and Muhammdiyah, the country's second largest Muslim organization, have been cooperating to promote a more peaceful image of Indonesian Muslims.