PPP executives talk on Soeharto's renomination

PPP executives talk on Soeharto's renomination

JAKARTA (JP): Unsettled debates forced executives of the
United Development Party (PPP) yesterday to extend by another day
their deliberation on candidates for president and vice
president.

Both the party's chairman Ismail Hasan Metareum and secretary-
general Tosari Wijaya confirmed yesterday that incumbent
President Soeharto was on its list of presidential nominees, but
the meeting failed to agree on whether to forward only one
candidate's name to the People's Consultative Assembly next
March.

"We haven't arrived at a conclusion... There are branches
nominating their own figures," Ismail said during a break in the
leadership meeting.

Soeharto's name has stood out in nominations for the top post.
The Yogyakarta branch of the Moslem-based party, however, swam
against the current by announcing recently it was nominating the
chairman of Moslem organization Muhammadiyah, Amien Rais.

Dominant Golkar is the first political organization to
renominate 76-year-old Soeharto, who has been in power for 30
years.

As for the vice presidential favorite, PPP has a long list of
choices that included incumbent Try Sutrisno, Ismail and Amien.

Tosari was quick to deny speculation that the meeting was
extended because it had reached a deadlock. He said the party
leaders just failed to reach "a unanimous decision" in time.

"It is common to have different ideas in such a forum. We are
now trying to unify those different aspirations in order to reach
a party stance accepted by everyone of us," Tosari told
reporters.

The deliberation started over the weekend and was scheduled to
end yesterday afternoon.

"Man can propose," Tosari argued. "But we have to acknowledge
representatives of the party's branches who have been invited to
deliver their aspirations here."

Tosari dismissed the speculation that the heated debates on
presidential and vice presidential candidates had split the party
and forced them to extend the meeting.

"We just failed to finish as scheduled," he said, adding that
the draft of the 1998/2003 State Policy Guidelines and the
protracted economic crisis were also highlighted in the meeting.

Ismail said debates on solutions to the monetary turmoil had
taken the party's executives to the limit, but still they failed
to reach an agreement.

"There have been some recommendations proposed by
participating party executives to the government, but we want to
make (the party's) advice even stronger," he said.

Ismail said the unsettled debates on economic reform had
postponed the announcement of the decisions taken by the party in
the meeting.

"We will disclose the collated results of our meeting once we
resolve the debate," he said. (amd)