NU leader ready to quit

MAGELANG, Central Java: The controversial leader of the 30- million strong Nahdlatul Ulama (NU) Moslem organization, Abdurrahman Wahid, says his re-election last year has yet to be recognized by the government.

"For that, I'm ready to quit if an NU extraordinary congress wants me to do so," Gus Dur, as he is better known, told participants of a workshop here on Sunday night.

Gus Dur said the government's refusal to recognize him has prompted some NU leaders to question his leadership legitimacy, though this hasn't posed any problem in the provinces.

Since he was reelected in a congress last year, he has not been come before President Soeharto as a sign of the government's recognition.

Asked why the government has not recognized him, Gus Dur said it had to do with his comments in A Nation in Waiting, a book by Adam Schwartz about Indonesia under President Soeharto.

He declined to go into specifics as to which point offended President Soeharto but argued that his remarks were "taken out of context. "It's a personal problem, actually," he said. (har/pan)