Scholar opposes presidential ruling amendment
JAKARTA (JP): A constitutional law professor lashed out on Tuesday at a proposal to amend Article 8 of the 1945 Constitution on the crucial role of the vice president.
Bagir Manan of the Bandung-based Padjadjaran University said on the sidelines of a People's Consultative Assembly (MPR) ad hoc commission session here that he suspected political motives behind the plan, targeted at Megawati Soekarnoputri.
"That's so. It's not fair if an amendment to the article is demanded because certain politicians do not like Megawati," Bagir said.
The article stipulates that if the president is incapacitated, the vice president will take over the government top job. Bagir said the article was both commonplace and universally applied.
He was commenting on House of Representatives Speaker Akbar Tandjung's statement, who said on Tuesday that Article 8 needed amending since the current president and vice president had not been elected in a package.
"If it's not a package, the vice president does not automatically replace the president if the latter is incapacitated," said Akbar, who is also chairman of the Golkar Party.
He said such an amendment would be unnecessary if the current system of electing the president was changed into one where he or she was elected directly.
The loose coalition of Muslim-based parties known as the "axis force" was the first group to raise the idea to amend the ruling. Assembly Speaker Amien Rais, who also chairs the National Mandate Party (PAN), has supported the proposal.
Amien said the appointment of B.J. Habibie to the presidential post replacing Soeharto in 1998 taught Indonesia that an automatic transfer of power (from president to vice president) raised legitimacy concerns. The vice president, he said, was not mandated by the Assembly to lead the country.
Bagir insisted that the president and vice president were elected in a single package, saying that when the Assembly members elected a vice president, they acknowledged Article 8.
He admitted that the Assembly had the right to amend the Constitution, but urged that it should heed the public and refrain from taking decisions arbitrarily.
However, Bagir agreed that in the unique situation in which both president and vice president were incapacitated, the Assembly and House speakers could take over to prepare for the next presidential election.
He suggested that a ruling on presidential elections be included in the Constitution instead of an Assembly decree or a law, which were inferior.
According to the 1973 Assembly decree, under the circumstances of both president and vice president becoming incapacitated then executive duties would be led by a triumvirate of the foreign affairs minister, home affairs minister and the Indonesian Military chief.
The decree stipulates that they be given three months to elect a new president. (jun)