LAKSAMANA.Net, August 1, 2004 11:55 PM
Review - Politics: Blast Precedes Results
Laksamana.Net - A small explosion rocked the General Election Commission (KPU)
Monday (26/7/04) as the agency prepared to announce final results of the country’s
first-ever direct presidential ballot.
No one was injured in the blast outside a ground-floor restroom, which was caused by
low-powered explosives. Police said they were investigating and would boost security
for the run-off election on September 20.
The building was evacuated after the blast but the incident only briefly halted final
counting. Hours later it was announced that front-runner Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono
had finished with 33.58% of the votes followed by President Megawati Sukarnoputri
with 26.29%. Yudhoyono and Megawati will compete in a second and final round.
Former military chief Wiranto came third in a field of five in the July 5 election with
22.2 % of the vote.
Analysts believe the run off could be a close call. Yudhoyono's Democrat Party came
in fourth in the parliamentary elections, with 10%, while Megawati's Indonesian
Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P) came second.
"Now the fight is between a challenger and an incumbent so I think it is really going to
be very difficult to predict. While Yudhoyono has an advantage in terms of personal
popularity, in terms of political machinery he is at a disadvantage," political
commentator Dewi Fortuna Anwar said.
Deal with Rais?
Both Yudhoyono and Megawati have been wooing first round losers ahead of the
September 20 final vote in the hope of securing the majority they both failed to achieve
in the initial poll.
Megawati is reported to have offered Golkar eight cabinet posts, but Yudhoyono
insisted he would not enter into any deals until the first-round outcome was known.
"He might have already left this one a bit late," said Damien Kingsbury, an expert on
Indonesian politics at Australia's Deakin University.
Yudhoyono said Friday (30/7/04) he and Amien Rais had agreed to "join our thoughts
and resources," although the two had not formed a direct coalition.
After a meeting with Rais in Yogyakarta, Yudhoyono told Elshinta radio the two had
agreed to pursue an agenda focusing on democratization, human rights, and law
enforcement and tackling corruption.
Rais, the current People's Consultative Assembly speaker and a former chairman of
Muhammadiyah - the country's second-largest Muslim social group - said it was "too
early" to talk of a meaningful coalition with Yudhoyono.
Yudhoyono agreed, saying the two were not yet at that stage, but they had "agreed to
continue communication in the future."
The National Awakening Party (PKB), the political arm of the country's largest Islamic
movement, Nahdlatul Ulama, and Indonesia’s third largest party, has sent mixed
signals on its intentions.
PKB deputy chairman Mahfud MD said Thursday (29/7/04) a decision to back
Yudhoyono made by a regional grouping of the party a day earlier was not binding.
Wiranto challenges results
Though international and domestic monitors have ruled that the ballot was largely free
and fair Wiranto has filed a complaint with the Supreme Court, alleging that
widespread irregularities at the polls damaged his chances of victory.
The retired general said he would seek a separate judicial Constitutional Court review
on "various problems" that occurred during and after the ballot.
Wiranto told reporters that millions of votes cast for him were lost. "We have lost as
many as 3.4 million votes through either the reduction of ballots cast for us or through
the multiplying of ballots (for other candidates)," he said Thursday (29/7/04). "We're
filing this complaint to ensure that the election was clean and fair," he said.
His campaign team has also said it would give evidence that poll workers inflated
other candidates' results, that government officials were pressured to vote for specific
candidates and that ballots were cast by underage voters or by citizens using dead
people's registration cards.
The team also said a recount of millions of ballots - deemed invalid because they were
punched twice - was carried out inconsistently.
Most analysts say Wiranto performed poorly because of a lack of support from the
Golkar Party, which nominated him, and because of his indictment for rights abuses
in East Timor.
In any event he said on Thursday (29/7/04) he had signed the final results of the
manual count. "We have signed the final results from the manual count of the election
... this means for the time being we accept the results," Wiranto told a packed news
conference. "Why for the time being? Because there were many irregularities," he
said.
US Lackeys
For one group at least, democracy is not yet in place, Students demonstrated on
Wednesday (28/7/04) and Friday outside the United States consulate in Surabaya to
denounce what they deemed Washington's interference in the elections.
They burned a US flag and called Megawati and Yudhoyono "US lackeys," Antara
news agency reported.
Protest leader Ihsan Tualeka said proof of the interference was the release of a poll
just hours after the vote by the US-based National Democratic Institute, accurately
predicting the Yudhoyono and Megawati results.
"Observing the elections is not an issue but by announcing the (projected) results
they could sway public opinion," he said.
Ba'asyir Hemmed In
Police said Friday (30/7/04) they would charge militant Muslim cleric Abu Bakar
Ba'asyir with involvement in the 2003 JW Marriott Hotel attack in Jakarta.
The decision came after the Constitutional Court declared Law No. 16/2003 on the
retroactive use of the 2003 anti-terror law to cover the Bali bombings unconstitutional,
and therefore invalid.
Ba'asyir was charged under Law No. 15/2003 on antiterrorism and Law No. 16/2003
on retroactivity that enables the police to charge suspects of the October 12, 2002
Bali blast under the Anti-terrorism Law, which remained a draft when the incident
occurred.
Police say they now have new evidence that Ba'asyir led the al-Qaeda-linked Jamaah
Islamiyah (JI), which has been blamed for a string of attacks in Indonesia in recent
years, including the Bali blasts in which 202 people died.
National Police chief of detectives Comr. Gen. Suyitno Landung Sudjono said
Ba'asyir, as the JI leader, masterminded the J.W. Marriott hotel bombing -- in which
12 people were killed -- though he had been in prison since August 2002.
Previously, the police had said Ba'asyir was behind all bomb attacks that rocked the
country from 1999 to 2002.
The JI, a UN-listed terrorist organization, is blamed for the Bali blast, which killed 202
people, and the August 5, 2003 Marriott attack.
Ba'asyir's lawyers demanded their client's immediate release because his detention
letter says he was charged under the wrong law.
However, Sudjono said that Ba'asyir's detention would stand because of evidence that
he was the leader of the JI.
"Law No. 15 stipulates that terrorism is an organized crime. So, Ba'asyir, as the
leader of the organization, must be held responsible," he said. Sudjono added that a
document found during a raid on a house in Semarang in 2003, also revealed that
Ba'asyir was the leader of JI.
"We confiscated explosives, guns and documents and arrested several JI members.
The documents reveal that Ba'asyir is the JI leader, and the suspects arrested said
they are JI members and Ba'asyir is their leader," he said.
"As the head of JI, it is very likely that he could have planned the Marriott attack
before his arrest in October, 2002. This is what we are still trying to unravel," national
police spokesman Insp. Gen. Paiman said elsewhere.
Ba'asyir accused police on Friday (30/7/04) of detaining him on Washington's orders.
"If America still does not want to release me, then I won't be released," Bashir said,
as he walked to prayers at Jakarta Police Headquarters where he is being held. "The
law is not working," he added. "What's working is US policy and US power."
BIN Wants More Powers
The national intelligence agency (BIN) needs more legal powers to prevent terror
attacks like the October 2002 Bali bombings or last year's deadly blast at a Jakarta
hotel, agency chief AM Hendropriyono said on Thursday (29/7/04).
Hendropriyono said BIN had no legal power to arrest suspects and urged speedy
drafting of a bill on intelligence to allow his agency to work more effectively.
"How can we prevent mice from entering a house? We can't do that. We have to look
for them in their dens," Hendropriyono told reporters.
"We need legal (power) to look for them but we don't have it. We are asking for an
intelligence law but it has not materialized yet because everybody makes a fuss of it,"
he said.
There were calls for the agency’s role to be expanded after the Bali attacks after
criticism of poor coordination between intelligence agencies.
Ambassador to East Timor
Jakarta has appointed Ahmad Bey Sofwan, a top National Intelligence Agency (BIN)
official who served as deputy head of analysis, as its first ambassador to East Timor,
five years after an independence vote led to the separation of the two countries.
Sofwan was among several new envoys installed by President Megawati Sukarnoputri
in a ceremony Thursday (29/7/04).
Indonesia had been represented by a lower level official in Dili since 1999, while East
Timor installed its ambassador to Jakarta in February 2003.
Foreign Minister Hassan Wirayuda told reporters after the ceremony that Sofwan had
been appointed to guarantee high-level contacts with East Timor.
"We see a need to put in place someone adequate for the duties in Dili because there
are many problems which still must be resolved, be they residual issues or new
problems that emerge,"
Elsewhere, Foreign Ministry spokesman Marty Natalegawa emphasized that the fact
Sofwan was an intelligence agency official should not be "over-analyzed." "Besides,
East Timor has no objections to the appointment," he told the press.
Envoys Deny Meddling
Two other envoys, the Japanese and US ambassadors to Indonesia, on Thursday
(29/7/04) dismissed accusations that they had interfered with the general election,
and asserted their readiness to cooperate with the next administration.
Japanese Ambassador Yutaka Iimura told a discussion organized by the Indonesian
Journalists Association (PWI) that Japan would stay neutral and was happy to work
with whoever is democratically elected in the upcoming presidential election.
"I know that there were rumors among political circles in Jakarta that we support
Megawati Sukarnoputri, while the US supports SBY (Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono),"
Iimura said, adding "we are neutral, and do not favor any candidate."
Separately, US Ambassador Ralph L. Boyce expressed surprise his compliment that
the election had been peaceful, successful and fair, had been regarded as
interference.
"I noticed that some foreign observers of the election were criticized, and frankly I am
a little bit surprised, because that was meant as a compliment," he said.
Boyce also denied reports that US Secretary of State Colin Powell met Yudhoyono
during his recent visit for the ASEAN Regional Forum (ARF), just days before the
presidential election.
"Powell came to attend the ARF meeting with 22 foreign ministers and it was a
multilateral meeting.
"He was unable to meet the President as he (instead) visited a refugee camp in
Sudan. He arrived late to pay a courtesy call on her," Boyce said.
Boyce added that it would be completely inappropriate to have a separate meeting
with Yudhoyono. "I want to ensure everybody he (Powell) did not (meet with Susilo)."
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