Poll ruling gives president free hand

Tiarma Siboro, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

Although future regional administration leaders, including governors, mayors and regents are to be directly elected by the people, the President will retain his influence over their fate in office.

According to the recently introduced government regulation on direct regional administration elections, any move by local councillors to impeach poor performing regional leaders would require the approval of the President.

The President can also temporarily suspend the administration leader without the approval of local councilors if the leader concerned has been implicated in a criminal case that carries a minimum sentence of five years' imprisonment. This arrangement does not differ from the one that is presently in place.

Various regions in the country will hold elections in June of this year to select new governors, regents and mayors, as some 226 regional administration leaders will end their terms soon. The new election system is aimed at helping promote democracy in the country.

According to Article 123 of the regulation, local councillors must propose any planned impeachment against an administration leader to the President, who, upon hearing the considerations of the Supreme Court, must make a decision within 30 days.

Among the reasons that could prompt local councillors to impeach a regional administration leader are, if the leader breaches their oath of office, or if they fail to perform their duty for six consecutive months.

A proposal to impeach a leader could only be put to the President in a plenary meeting of the local legislative council, attended by at least three fourths of local council members, two thirds of whom would need to support the proposal.

Local councillors in this era of regional autonomy have taken to directly dismissing poor performing local administration leaders.

One prominent case was the move in 2002 by councillors in Surabaya, East Java to impeach the city's then mayor Sunarto Prawiro for his prolonged, unexplained absence in office.

On behalf of the central government, then minister of home affairs Hari Sabarno defended Sunarto, but finally bowed to the councillors' demand and installed Bambang D.H., who at the time was Sunarto's deputy as his successor and backed by a leading political party.

Meanwhile, President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono opened a two-day working meeting of regional administration leaders from across the country on Thursday.

In his speech at the State Palace, the President urged candidates running for regional administration posts to refrain from involvement in money politics.

Susilo emphasized to the governors, provincial police chiefs, prosecutor's office heads and provincial military commanders present that election candidates must be ready to lose with honor.

"When I was a vice presidential candidate in the 2001 election, and I lost, I quickly called a press conference to announce my defeat, although I had many reasons to complain about the election process," he said.

The President also asked the candidates to discourage violent behavior among their supporters during the campaign period.