Yet another row
Yet another row
As controversy upon controversy continues to rock Jakarta's
political scene with no sign of abating, the big question now
seems to be no longer when all this is going to stop, but how.
Certainly, the President of the Republic discreetly meeting
with a convicted felon -- former president Soeharto's youngest
son Hutomo "Tommy" Mandala Putra, who has been sentenced to 18
months in prison for corruption -- is highly irregular, to say
the least, even if a year under the Abdurrahman Wahid presidency
has taught Indonesians to expect not only the unexpected, but the
inconceivable.
Was the meeting so vital to the nation? If so, why the hush-
hush? The President only admitted to the meeting after it was
leaked in the media. Tommy is known to have applied for a
presidential pardon, which the President said he would reject.
Then there was talk about the possibility of the President
granting Tommy his request after all, but on condition that he
"donate" some of the Soeharto family's wealth that is believed to
have been stashed away in foreign banks, to the nation.
On this the government has remained silent. Still one might
presume that the talks between the President and Tommy were to
examine that possibility. Indonesians recall how some time ago
the President assigned the Coordinating Minister for Political,
Social and Security Affairs Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono the task of
negotiating with the ex-dictator's children for the return of
some of the wealth allegedly taken by the Soeharto family.
Nothing came of those negotiations as far as is known.
In the minds of Indonesians there is little doubt that such
wealth exists. Geoff Hiscock, the international business editor
of The Australian newspaper, for example, in his book Asia's New
Wealth Club estimates the Soeharto family's wealth to stand at
US$2.2 billion at present -- downsized from $6.6 billion before
the onset of the financial crisis in 1997.
"... the ambitious sons and daughters of President Soeharto
had built billion-dollar empires in property, banking, industry,
telecoms, media, and transport in the 1980s and 1990s, the like
of which had never been seen in Indonesia," Hiscock writes.
As speculation about the covert meeting has grown, neither the
government nor the President's office has presented an
explanation to clear up the befuddlement, whereas a speedy
clarification could have prevented the issue from becoming
controversial.
As things are, it is difficult to escape the impression that
something fishy might be going on involving the President.
Whether that will in the future be proven true or not, the
consequences could be disastrous for the nation, already hit by
the worst economic crisis it has ever experienced.
As for Abdurrahman Wahid, this unfortunate episode could
provide ammunition for his political adversaries to make life
even more difficult for the beleaguered President, even to the
point of turning impeachment into a real possibility.
The country's highest policymaking body, the People's
Consultative Assembly (MPR), in one of its decrees, has
instructed the President to bring to court all those who are
suspected of having committed serious crimes of corruption,
collusion or nepotism in the past. Violation of an MPR decree can
push the Assembly toward holding a Special Session to impeach the
President.
That would be all Indonesians need. In the end, the ones to
suffer the most would not be Abdurrahman Wahid, but the people of
Indonesia.