PKB leadership battle hots up
Bambang Nurbianto and Asip A. Hasani, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta/Yogyakarta
The impasse in the leadership tug of war which has split the National Awakening Party (PKB) has failed to dampen its politicians' ambitions to get to the top.
While the upcoming congress of one camp will only formally install Matori Abdul Djalil, competition for the top job in the camp loyal to Abdurrahman "Gus Dur" Wahid is heating up.
Matori's congress in Jakarta on Jan. 14 will basically be a one-man show because he is unchallenged.
The Gus Dur camp is obviously more luring for ambitious politicians. One more name made the list of candidates on Thursday, taking the total number to six.
The latest figure to secure his name on the list was Marzuki Usman, a former chief of the Investment Coordinating Board under the Soeharto regime and forestry minister under president Abdurrahman Wahid.
The others are Saifullah Yusuf, a nephew of Gus Dur; ex- foreign minister and current acting PKB chairman Alwi Shihab; former defense minister Muhammad Mahfud MD; former research and technology minister A.S. Hikam; and chairperson of the PKB faction in the House of Representatives, Ali Masykur Musa.
Alwi and Saifullah are widely seen as the strongest candidates to lead the party founded by leaders of the 40 million-strong Muslim organization Nahdlatul Ulama (NU).
Mahfud is expected to get the support of NU strongholds in East Java, particularly Madura Island, where he hails from.
Saifullah, leader of Ansor, NU's youth wing, has had his loyalty to PKB questioned by critics because he officially joined PKB only last Tuesday after he served as a legislator for President Megawati Soekarnoputri's Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI Perjuangan).
A reliable source said Saifullah was asked by Gus Dur, a founder of the PKB, to resign from PDI Perjuangan on the grounds that his uncle wanted him to lead the PKB. Gus Dur denied the report.
Saifullah's candidacy has also provoked suspicion that he is being used by PDI Perjuangan to spy on the PKB.
Some pro-Abdurrahman PKB activists have suspected that PDI Perjuangan has contributed to the worsening conflict plaguing the PKB, the fourth largest party.
They claim that PDI Perjuangan provides financial assistance to Matori and Saifullah to keep the internal bickering aflame to tarnish the PKB's image.
Chairman of PDI Perjuangan's faction in the House Roy B.B. Janis flatly rejected the charges, saying Saifullah had expressed his wish to shift his loyalty to the PKB long before Gus Dur was fired as president last July.
Megawati and Gus Dur were close allies until the impeachment process which resulted in his ouster and to Megawati becoming president.
Roy claimed that Megawati broke down to tears when Saifullah insisted on his plan to quit PDI Perjuangan.
"We have tried in vain to maintain his membership in PDI Perjuangan. So, it is strange if our party is accused of engineering Saifullah's retirement," Roy told the Post.
The pro-Abdurrahman PKB faction will hold its extra-ordinary congress in the court city of Yogyakarta from Jan. 17 to Jan. 19.
Yogyakarta Sultan Hemengku Buwono X met with the party's official on Thursday to discuss the plan.
"Pak Sultan wished us luck and promised to address the congress," said Arifin Junaedi, the party's advisory board secretary.