Our simmering political climate

On Friday the plan to establish a National Alert Command Center was announced by President Soeharto. The announcement reminded many people of the defunct internal security agency, which was installed immediately after Soeharto received the March 11 Order in 1966 (giving him full authority to put down the 1965 communist coup attempt).

We do not know as yet how much power the new command is to be given, but the President's remarks make it certain that the new command center is meant to prevent unrest in the early stages. The command will take preventive measures by monitoring people who are suspected of instigating trouble, distributing leaflets and other such acts.

The step indicates that the current situation warrants our extra vigilance. We sense that the political temperature is rising, and not only because we are facing the general elections. During the past elections, the political climate pending the campaigning and the voting did indeed show a tendency to heat up, but this was mostly due to competition between contestants or because of trouble within the contesting organizations themselves.

The rising political climate this time is of a much more fundamental nature. According to the President, the situation is now endangering stability. One of our neighboring countries has already taken preventive security steps by drafting a law which eventually became known as the Internal Security Act.

In our own country a similar law already exists in the anti- subversion law. Among lawyers and politicians, however, a plea is made for a revising of this law to bring it more in line with the times.

-- Republika, Jakarta