PKB will welcome former PAN figures

JAKARTA (JP): The National Awakening Party (PKB) is ready to welcome political figures who recently quit the National Mandate Party's executive board, said a PKB executive.

"The PKB, as an inclusive and cross-religious party, will be willing to welcome them if former PAN figures want to join the party," Effendi Choirie, chief of the PKB's autonomy affairs section, said here on Monday.

"They have high integrity and a moral commitment to national interests that match our party's political platform," he added.

Effendi admitted that the PKB executive board had already discussed the desire of several former PAN figures to join the party.

So far, there has been no reaction from the 16 former PAN functionaries who submitted their resignation over the weekend.

Meanwhile, Hatta Radjasa, PAN's secretary general, said that neither the party nor its other functionaries could prevent the 16 from quitting the party and from joining other political parties.

But, Hatta stressed that the exodus had nothing to do with controversy over PAN's political platform because it had been decided at the party's national congress last year in Yogyakarta.

"During the congress, we decided to maintain the party's inclusiveness and openness for all religions and ethnicities. I don't think that the 16 are disappointed with the party's platform and their exit has nothing to do with any internal conflicts in the party," he said.

During the congress there was a major debate over whether PAN would lean towards becoming more Islamist.

Hatta, also chairman of the reform faction in the House of Representatives, added that he did not expect the resignations to affect the party's potential vote in the 2004 general election.

He said the 16 who quit were only a small part of the 350 qualified cadres on the executive board and that the party, therefore, still had numerous cadres ready to fill their positions in the party. (rms)