Students protest about party rules
JAKARTA (JP): Hundreds of students of the Indonesian Moslem Students Action Union staged an orderly rally in front of the People's Consultative Assembly/House of Representatives (MPR/DPR) building in Central Jakarta on Thursday.
Their demands included, among other things, the rejection of Pancasila (the state's ideology) as the sole principle for political parties, the revocation of the Armed Forces' (ABRI) dual function and the acceleration of the general election.
"The general election needs accelerating so as to choose a legitimate national leader," Fitra, the union's coordinator, said.
As soon as the students finished disclosing their demands, they dispersed peacefully at 11:45 a.m.
Thursday's demonstration followed a massive anti-Habibie protest by thousands of students at the same place on Wednesday.
Meanwhile, in anticipation to next month's MPR Special Session, the city administration would hold a massive public parade to be attended by over 100,000 Jakartans at the Senayan East Parking Lot in Central Jakarta on Saturday.
Head of the city's social and political affairs directorate Bagus Suharyono said on Thursday the parade would be held to show the public's readiness to help maintain security in the capital as the existing security officers alone were not enough.
"It has been predicted that various political groups will emerge during the event, while the number of security personnel is very limited compared to the size of the city," he said.
He said that it was impossible for the 78,000 security officers to maintain security in the city which has a width of 650-kilometers and about 10 million residents.
Bagus said that the people were ready to face any possible massive demonstrations during the Nov. 10 to Nov. 13 session.
He said that the city's five mayoralties, which would also hold similar parades in their respective areas on Friday, had been asked to send their representatives to the planned massive parade on Saturday.
"Actually, we should be on alert every day as there's almost not one single day without a demonstration in the city," he told a communications forum of public figures, including religious leaders, business people and youths, at the City Hall.
Bagus said that his directorate's data showed that there had been 133 opposition groups, which had held 667 kinds of public gatherings, including street demonstrations, mass prayers and leaflet distributions, since the resignation of president Soeharto on May 21. (ind/hhr)