PPP activists sue governor over color war
SEMARANG (JP): The United Development Party (PPP) kept its promise yesterday to sue Central Java Governor Soewardi for encouraging the public to paint public property yellow to help Golkar win the May general election.
Party activists in Surakarta (Solo), Sragen, Boyolali, Klaten, Sukoharjo and Wonogiri registered their lawsuit with the Semarang district court yesterday.
Soewardi has been urging people in Central Java to paint their fences and doors and public property such as telegraph poles, trees and sidewalks yellow.
Yellow is the color of the dominant Golkar grouping.
The PPP activists said the governor had failed to remain neutral by helping Golkar's campaign. His policy, they said, had hurt the PPP and the Indonesian Democratic Party (PDI).
They are seeking more than Rp 7 billion (US$3 million) in damages and court costs and have demanded that the court order the governor to sell his controversial Rp 8 billion mansion that was built with public money.
The Moslem-oriented party promised to donate the money for damages, if it wins the case, to the athletes in the Central Java team who did not receive the financial rewards they were promised for their victories at the National Games last September.
Thoyfoer, the deputy chairman of the PPP provincial branch, said he supported the activists. Some say their case will win voter sympathy.
"They are demonstrating their social concern. I think common people will support their cause," he told The Jakarta Post yesterday.
The spokesman for the Semarang district court, Sumartono, said the court would be impartial even though the governor was the defendant.
Governor Soewardi told the Post he was keen to answer the accusations in court.
"Please feel free to sue me. Everyone in the province who believes to be a victim of my policies can," he said. He is yet to appoint defense lawyers.
The governor's "yellowization" policy met the strongest resistance in the ancient city of Solo. In January, PPP activists repainted yellow objects in the city white, a supposedly neutral color.
PDI members entered the war last month when they took to the streets repainting objects red and white, the color of the Indonesian flag.
More recently, several staff of the Sultan of Solo's family, voiced objections to the yellowization drive and filed a complaint with the mayor of Solo.
The color war is continuing. Some objects in public places have changed color six times since January with Golkar activists repainting objects yellow and PDI and PPP activists repainting them again.
Soehardjo, a legal expert at Diponegoro University in Semarang, supported the PPP activists move.
"There is nothing wrong with people suing the government," he said. (pan)