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ASIET NetNews Number 7 - February 23-March 1, 1998
East TimorThousands of students demonstrate Student protests in Jakarta/Yogya, Hundreds of students rally for reform
Political/economic crisisPloughshares action for East Timor
Environment/land disputesIMF mulls keeping some subsidies Double or nothing Economic crisis leads to scapegoating of ethnic Spectre of famine Asian meltdown hits Indonesian hospitals
Human rights/lawFires raging as ASEAN ministers meet Parched Borneo catches fire again
PoliticsLBH offices pelted with stones Report on recent killings and arrests Three women arrested in peaceful protest Suharto intensifies repression
Golkar cadres warned not to break ranks Islam puts Soeharto on notice B.J. Habibie Divides a nation The new dis-order government
| Democratic struggle |
Jakarta -- More than 3,000 students rallied noisily in the Indonesian capital Thursday, blaming President Suharto and his government for the crisis which has crippled the country.
"Reforms, reforms," the crowd chanted with raised fists as students and alumni took turns climbing on top of a car to address the gathering on an open field within the University of Indonesia's sprawling southern Jakarta campus.
"What is needed now is to settle the root of the problem," shouted one of the speakers, economics lecturer Faisal Basri. "Everyone knows, students know, the people know that Suharto is the origin of all the problems," he said.
The students marched round the campus for more than five hours, their ranks swelling from the original 200, before finally gathering at the field in front of the social sciences faculty where the rally began.
The rally which ended peacefully late Thursday was conducted under the watchful eye of police while soldiers patrolled the perimeter of the satellite campus in Depok, West Java, 30 kms south of here.
One student said he was very please with the day's turnout. "We will not stop fighting," he said, without identifying himself.
Banners demanded lower prices, the eradication of corrupt, collusive and manipulative practice, for the people to hold power rather than the authorities and for Suharto to be accountable.
"We still have time to show the MPR what we want," said Sri Edi Swasosno, an alumni and former official of the national development planning agency. [His brother, Sri-Bintang Pamungkas is currently on trial for subversion.] (AP quotes him as saying: "Dont hope for economic or political reform as long as Suharto is still in power".)
One banner carried by the students described the MPR meeting as a comedy.
No uniformed security personnel were visible on the campus but more than 70 plainclothes military intelligence agents could be seen following the marchers. At least four truckloads of police and soldiers in full riot gear were seen outside the campus, along with scores of rapid response troops on motorcycles with automatic rifles.
The "yellow jackets" as students of the university are known, were a major force behind Suharto's rise to power in 1966. Large signs welcoming people to "The campus of the New Order" at the central campus were covered in funeral shrouds or defaced during the demonstration on Wednesday.
Public gatherings have been banned in the capital for the period surrounding the presidential selection and street protests have been broken up. However, the authorities have been tolerant of student demonstrations as long as they remain on their campuses.
Jakarta -- A long-time bastion of support for President Suharto turned on him Wednesday as hundreds of current and former students at the University of Indonesia, Jakarta, condemned the leadership they helped to install in 1966
The protesters rallied peacefully at the University's central campus... several were wearing traditional yellow jackets and drapped a funeral shroud over a sign welcoming the arrive of Suharto's "New Order" rule.
"The irony is that even though the socio-economic turmoil has been going on for several months and has turned into the greatest downturn for the New Order, it appears that there are no firm, systematic and consistent efforts to overcome it effectively", the protesters said in a statement.
It was the bigger demonstration in Jakarta over the devastating economic crisis. Some 100 troops and at least 70 plain clothes military intelligence agents were deployed but no violence was reported, witnesses said.
"What we have now really cannot be supported," University of Indonesia's alumni chairman Hariadi Darmawan told reporters. Darmawan is a former brigadier general and now foresty ministry inspector general, whose daughter is married to Vice-President Try Sutrisno's son. [That makes him a top bureaucrat!]
The protesters said flawed policies had led Indonesia to the economic crisis and were responsible for the consequences, including rioting that has rocked 25 cities and towns in recent weeks. "The practices of power abuse, collusion, corruption manipultation... are now seen as normal and not shameful any longer," the statement said..
The statement, issued on behalf of the university's academic community also called on the powerful armed forces to "return to their role as real guardian of the state". It also urged civil servants to "return and practise their real mission as servants of the state and society, siding with the entire people and not only certain groups."
"We are here for a moral action," said senior university economics professor Sri Edi Swasono, senior official of the national development planning board.
The authorities have broken up recent demonstrations but are tolerating protests on campues.
Meanwhile according to AP, Hariyadi said: "There's no rule of law among the people who benefit." Chanting and raising their fists, protesters called for the ouster of President Suharto.
Protesters sprayed black paind on a billboard at the university declaring it a New Order campus and hung a white sheet over a billboard nearby. A truckload of black-clad police parked near the camppus gates and police and soldiers with walkie-talkies watched from the streets but protesters did not venture on to the street.
No violence has been reported in Jakarta but troops are on alert to safeguard the electoral assembly. More military trucks cruise the streets and some units are unsing hotels as headquarters.
Hundreds of students in Yogyakarta, Central Java marched in protest against Suharto. "Bring down Suharto," read a banner in a peaceful protest at the prestigious Gadjah Mada university. Six philosophy students entered the third day of a hunger strike.
Jakarta -- Hundreds of students have rallied in one Indonesian city and six are on hunger strike elsewhere demanding comprehensive political and economic reforms.
Some six hundred students staged rallied at two campuses in the West Java capital city of Bandung Monday and six went on hunger strike in Yogyakarta. The students at Bandung's Pajajaran and Pasundan universities staged an orderly protest on campus grounds after being blocked by anti-riot squads from marching to the provincial parliament building, a local police officer said. There were no more protests today.
In Yogyakarta, Central Java, six Gadjah Mada University students entered the second day of a hunger strike on campus to demand lower prices and an end to racial violence, a witness said.
The banner-waving students were wearing white bandanas on their heads in a gesture of solidarity, a university staff member said. "They have set up tents and been sleeping there since yesterday," he said. The hunger strike will continue until their demands have been heard or until doctors declared it was impossible for them to continue.
In Bandung, West Java provincial police chief said the students had been banned from marching in the streets because they disrupted security, adding that the ban would stay in force as long as necessary.
Meanwile, in Pekanbaru, capital of Riau province in Central Sumatra, 20 students went to the provincial parliament to demand touch action against hoarders of basic goods.
| East Timor |
Today the 25th of February, Cecilia Redner and Marija Fischer from the women's ploughshares group Choose Life were found guilty of attempt to malicious damage and violation of the law protecting facilities important to society (roughly translated). Cecilia, a priest in the Church of Sweden, was sentenced to fines and three years of correctional education. Marija, a student, was sentenced to fines and two years suspended sentence.
"Our action was about protecting human rights. The Swedish judicial system ought to protect human rights abroad as well as in Sweden. Knowing what is happening on East Timor, we should have been found not guilty.", Marija said.
The 19th of April 1997 Cecilia and Marija entered the arms factory of Bofors in Karlskoga. There they planted an apple tree and attempted to disarm a naval canon of the type that is being exported to Indonesia. In a overcrowded court room Cecilia and Marija tried to explain their action, although the judge interupted them continously. Since 1975 Indonesia has been occupying East Timor. Because of the occupation it is estimated that between 200.000 and 300.000 East Timorese have died. In 1996, Bofors sold weapons to Indonesia at the rate of some #5.5 million. Cecilia therefore argued:
"When my country is arming a dictator I am not aloud to be passive and obedient, since it would make me guilty to the genoside on East Timor. I know what is going on and I can not only blaim the Indonesian dictatorship or my own government. Our ploughshares action was a way for us to take responsability and act in solidarity with the people of East Timor."
Using the necessity defence Marija and Cecilia pleaded not guilty. "We tried to prevent a crime, and that is an obligation according to our law", Marija explains and hoped to get aquitted just as the four women in Liverpool 1996. The court obviously made a different conclusion. "Surely we are going to appeal!"
The use of civil disobedience by the Swedish Ploughshares movement always means that the breaking of a law is done accountably and nonviolently. This means that the activists do not try to escape and no one is threatened or harmed. With civil disobedience democratical processes are started and the aim is to change the law or to agree on new political decisions.
| Political/economic crisis |
Canberra -- International Monetary Fund Director for Asia-Pacific Hubert Neiss Wednesday said the fund is examining ways to preserve subsidies for food, rice and cooking oil in Indonesia under its assistance package.
When asked in a television interview from Washington whether the IMF is considering delaying the removal of subsidies on some items in Indonesia, Neiss said, "Yes we are studying ways and means to preserve those subsidies that benefit the very poor sections of society.''Basically, subsidies for food, for rice, for cooking oil," he said.
Indonesia has agreed to a $43 billion financial assistance package that requires it to meet a series of economic and financial system criteria. Falls in the value of the rupiah, spiraling inflation and food riots in the country have prompted calls from some countries, including Australia, to a softening in the IMF's hardline policy stance.
When asked about the IMF's flexibility in its approach to Asian economies that are receiving assistance from the Fund, Neiss said, "IMF programs are never rigid, they are applied flexibly in all Asian-crisis countries."
He added, "for instance, we have just agreed for more expansionary fiscal policy both in South Korea and in Thailand to make allowance for a larger economic decline that was originally foreseen, and for a larger need to support the unemployed."
A defiant Suharto gambles everything on an unorthodox financial plan that could cost Indonesia the IMF's support. In the process, the region's one-time leader may have become its biggest liability.
John McBeth, Jakarta -- As Indonesia edges closer to the economic precipice, President Suharto seems engaged in a game of brinkmanship that is jangling nerves across the region. He has dispensed with orthodox policy management, firing the central- bank governor, Sudradjat Djiwandono, only weeks before his term was due to expire. And his decision to give the vice-presidential slot to B.J. Habibie, the controversial research and technology minister, seems set in stone.
"There's been a real change in his political behaviour," says political scientist Salim Said, struggling to explain the actions of a proud and stubborn leader desperately seeking to pluck his country from a deepening financial and social quagmire. "These are not normal times. We have to now try and understand him and why he is thinking in such a different way."
With price-related riots spreading through dozens of Javanese towns, Suharto did act predictably on one count: He replaced armed-forces commander Gen. Feisal Tanjung with a trusted army chief of staff and former presidential aide, Gen. Wiranto. Suharto also promoted four other officers in this long-awaited reshuffle, announced on February 12. Among them was his ambitious son-in-law, Lt.-Gen. Prabowo Subianto, who moves from the Special Forces to take command of the important Army Strategic Reserve, known as Kostrad.
On the economic front, Suharto's statement on February 9 that he wanted to "kill the speculators" signalled that he sees the controversial currency-board system, which would peg the rupiah to the U.S. dollar, as a weapon against the unseen enemy that he blames for Indonesia's crisis. A Western diplomat says: "His preoccupation right now is stabilizing the rupiah. That's all he can think of."
Despite the International Monetary Fund's written ultimatum that it would withdraw its $33 billion rescue package if he proceeds with the currency-board venture, Suharto may be calculating that the United States -- distracted by its confrontation with Iraq -- won't want to risk the possibility of an impoverished Indonesia destabilizing the rest of the region. Indeed, that prospect -- and the more immediate risk of an exodus of Indonesian-Chinese refugees -- is already alarming Singaporean and Malaysian officials.
U.S. Treasury officials were not told beforehand of the IMF letter, and are now worried that the fund has restricted Washington's room for manoeuvre. When President Bill Clinton called Suharto on February 14, according to government sources, the Indonesian leader complained that the IMF package had failed to stabilize the rupiah. Suharto said he would drop the currency-board plan only if the U.S. and other rich nations came up with an acceptable alternative.
Andrew MacIntyre, an Indonesia specialist at the Graduate School of International Relations and Pacific Studies at the University of California, feels the currency-board plan is an act of desperation. "Suharto is fighting for his survival and he cannot survive if the economy doesn't recover. The currency board is the last chance for him. It's quite doubtful it would work in the longer run, but in the short run it offers him a quick fix." A frustrated Suharto needs any sort of fix to demonstrate he has the power to tame the markets. His impatience also clearly stems from the fact that he wants to be able to halve the current exchange rate for the rupiah, which on February 18 was hovering near 10,000 to the dollar, before his expected re-election by the People's Consultative Assembly in March.
Suharto's removal of Bank Indonesia chief Sudradjat, meanwhile, is seen by analysts as an act of vindictiveness. The president appears to be placing more stock in a little-known American economist, Steve Hanke, the main proponent of the currency board, than in mainstream economic wisdom.
The currency-board concept is not without merit. "What Indonesia needs is a stick to keep on the straight and narrow to convincing reform and genuine transparency -- and that's what the currency board requires," says Eugene Galbraith, regional head of research for ABN-Amro Hoare Govett. But many analysts, including Galbraith, question whether Indonesia would be able to withstand the shock of interest rates skyrocketing to defend the peg, which might happen once it was implemented. What Indonesia also needs, they point out, is political credibility.
If Suharto's gamble fails, Indonesia will enter unknown territory. Only new leadership would be likely to restore economic stability -- but who, if anyone, will apply the pressure to make Suharto go? Some analysts believe it will take uncontrolled rioting in Jakarta itself to persuade the new military leadership, packed as it is with Suharto loyalists, to conclude that the president has now become all of the problem. "Frankly, I don't think they will intervene," says an experienced military observer. Whatever that point of intervention is, he adds, "we're still a long way from it."
In such a situation the armed forces could split, according to Australian National University analyst Harold Crouch. There is at best a "correct" relationship between Wiranto and Suharto son-in-law Prabowo, who now commands Indonesia's main two- division combat force. "Some may want to move and some may not," Crouch says. "A coup would be a very risky proposition."
In the meantime, Wiranto has been seeking to cool an orchestrated anti-Chinese campaign that has discouraged businessmen from repatriating billions of dollars parked offshore and which sent a dangerous signal to rioters who have looted Chinese-owned shops across Java, Sulawesi, Lombok and Flores.
Three days before the military reshuffle, Wiranto publicly warned against fanning anti-Chinese sentiments. "If this happens, it's wrong," Wiranto said. "We have to fight against it and neutralize it."
Wiranto's statement stood in marked contrast to the rhetoric of Feisal and the behind-the-scenes actions of Prabowo. Both have publicly attacked ethnic Chinese -- particularly business-community spokesman Sofyan Wanandi and his brother Jusuf, an internationally known political scientist. Sofyan had drawn Feisal's ire -- and possibly Suharto's -- by dismissing the government's "Love the Rupiah" campaign as meaningless and calling instead for policies to help businessmen get back on their feet.
Western sources familiar with the Indonesian military's thinking say the message is getting across in the officer corps that "focusing the blame on the Chinese is going to be a disaster." The sources point out that if the impression gained ground in Hong Kong, Singapore and Taiwan that Indonesia was adopting an openly anti-Chinese bias, it would cut off important sources of foreign investment to help the country's eventual recovery. Dealing with ethnic disharmony is one of many challenges facing Wiranto, 50, and a new-generation military leadership divided at times by ambition and political uncertainty but unified in confronting the biggest threat to public order in 30 years. If countering social unrest remains the army's priority, one issue Wiranto is unlikely to do anything about is the Habibie vice- presidency.
Many people feel Habibie is an unwise choice. Among them are Singapore Senior Minister Lee Kuan Yew, top IMF officials, the president's own children and even his close friend Mohamad "Bob" Hasan. But Habibie increasingly seems to be the man Suharto wants.
The ruling Golkar Party, the Muslim-oriented United Development Party and the military have already lined up behind Habibie. Insiders say outgoing army chief Feisal -- a close friend of the unorthodox minister -- put Habibie's name forward at a meeting with Suharto before an army leadership conference on February 10-11. He later made it official in one of his last public pronouncements before handing over to Wiranto.
As long as Habibie is seen to be the palace favourite, the generals are unlikely to make their reservations about him public. "The military didn't like Vice-President Sudharmono a decade ago, but that's who they got," observes one analyst. "And they have a lot less power vis-a-vis the president now than they had then."
In the reshuffle, Wiranto's former position as army chief was taken by a former presidential bodyguard, Lt.-Gen. Subagio -- another Special Forces commander like Prabowo. But while both men were sworn in almost immediately, other changes of command will not take effect until after the People's Consultative Assembly meeting in March.
This may be especially significant in the case of Lt.-Gen. Yunus Yosfiah, 54, the chief of social and political affairs and one of a handful of Habibie associates in the armed-forces hierarchy. Analysts suspect Yunus is being retained long enough to guide the vice-presidential process to its conclusion before handing over to Maj.-Gen. Bambang Yudhoyono, one of Wiranto's closest associates.
Prabowo replaces Lt.-Gen. Sugiono, another former presidential adjutant who now becomes deputy army chief. At 46, the move makes Prabowo the youngest three-star general in the modern Indonesian Army. His is the son of former presidential economic adviser Sumitro Djojohadikusumo and husband of Suharto's middle daughter, Siti Hedijanti Herijadhi. If Wiranto's relations with Prabowo are strained, in large part because the elder general has sought to rein in the younger man, analysts say, that doesn't mean the army is as divided as it may sometimes appear. "Take away Prabowo and what have you got?" says one. "He has his force of personality, his relations with the president and to some extent his connections in the Special Forces, but you won't get anyone to say he's in Prabowo's camp or part of his faction."
A Yogyakarta-born Javanese Muslim, Wiranto spent much of his early army career in North Sulawesi, before serving four years with the Malang, East Java-based 2nd Kostrad Division. He was a battalion commander in 1982-83, undertook a year-long assignment at the Army Infantry Weapons Centre under then Brig.-Gen. Feisal Tanjung and then returned to Malang to fill various staff positions.
His biggest break came in 1989, when Suharto, always on the lookout for officers with off-Java experience, personally chose him from a list of 10 promising colonels to act as his adjutant. It was a position he held until 1993, and which shot his career forward like a rocket, sending him from Jakarta-region chief of staff to army commander in only three years.
Wiranto is seen to be the consummate professional, and the maturing process that comes with rubbing shoulders with the rich and powerful means he is no political novice. "A presidential adjutant is almost a shadow minister," notes a retired general. "It's an opportunity for him to learn statecraft at the macro- national level. He sits in cabinet meetings and he carries notes from the president to his ministers. It's on-the-job training." As Indonesia lurches further into crisis, that training should be eminently useful.
The rise in prices of basic goods such as rice and cooking oil has led to violent protests across Indonesia, much of it aimed at the ethnic Chinese minority who dominate the retail economy. The rioting appears to have been largely spontaneous, but Human Rights Watch believes that senior government and military officials have fueled anti-Chinese sentiment through veiled references to "rats" and "traitors" and by their failure to explain that high prices and food shortages are not the fault of individual retailers. Human Rights Watch calls on the government to state explicitly that the ethnic Chinese are a valued and important part of Indonesian society and that violence against them and their property will not be tolerated. Denouncing communal violence in generic terms is not enough. The government should cease immediately the harassment of two prominent members of the ethnic Chinese community, Jusuf and Sofyan Wanandi. Finally, it needs to begin immediately a longer-term effort to end the discrimination against the ethnic Chinese in Indonesia that has existed since the late 1950s. In a commentary in the February 3, 1998 edition of the Asian Wall Street Journal, Indonesia expert Adam Schwarz suggested that President Soeharto take the lead by including an ethnic Chinese in his next cabinet. The government would do well to take that suggestion to heart.
Over the last two months, violence against ethnic Chinese has erupted across the country. After a series of outbreaks in Java, the unrest had by mid-February hit the islands of Sumatra, Sulawesi, Lombok, Sumbawa, and Flores as well. In most cases, the protests have been related to sharp increases in the prices of the so-called nine basic commodities (among them rice, wheat flour, cooking oil, sugar, soybeans, and eggs) as a result of the dramatic loss in value of the rupiah, the Indonesian currency. The targets of the violence have been Chinese-owned shops, homes, and businesses.
In none of the dozens of outbreaks of violence chronicled in this report (available on-line at: http://www.hrw.org/hrw/press98/feb/indo-al1.htm) has there been evidence of direct government instigation of the rioters, and the government has been quick to send troops to disturbed areas and arrest alleged ringleaders. Nevertheless, some senior officials have appeared to endorse the anti- Chinese sentiment. Not only have they expressed no sympathy for the victims or made any effort to explain to the public the causes and consequences of the economic crisis, but in some cases, they have tried to deflect blame for the economic crisis onto prominent members of the ethnic Chinese community.
On January 14, for example, the commander of the armed forces in a press conference called on the owners of thirteen large conglomerates to bring their dollars back from abroad and convert them to rupiah. Nowhere was the word "Chinese" mentioned, but the appeal was an implicit accusation that wealthy Chinese were contributing to the currency crisis by selfishly keeping dollars stashed abroad at a time when the rupiah needed bolstering. In late January, Lt.Gen. Syarwan Hamid was reported to have made pointed references to the ethnic Chinese as "rats" who have no sense of patriotism and who at a time of crisis are salting away "the fruits of our national development." President Soeharto's son-in-law, Maj. Gen. Prabowo Subianto, then head of the army Special Forces (Kopassus) and since promoted to commander of the Strategic Reserve (Kostrad, the army's most elite unit), attended a much-publicized breaking of the Ramadan fast with Muslim leaders on January 23 during which he blamed the crisis on a political conspiracy, and others attending explicitly linked the conspirators to "the conglomerate group" and those with their "henchmen operating overseas." The two phrases were clear references to the ethnic Chinese, and Prabowo, instead of distancing himself from the remarks, tacitly endorsed them, urging a united front between the army and Islam. By warning over and over that the draconian anti-subversion law would be applied to hoarders of basic goods without at the same time explaining the difficulties that many shopkeepers are facing, the army has helped generate suspicions that any shop owner who refuses to sell at pre-crisis prices, or who closes his or her shop for fear of violence, is deliberately making goods scarce to keep prices high. The most obvious example of high-level attempts to focus the spotlight on the ethnic Chinese has been the army's targeting of prominent businessman Sofyan Wanandi, in an incident described more fully below.
Veiled and not-so-veiled attacks on the patriotism of the ethnic Chinese have a long history in Indonesia, going back to the Chinese role in the Dutch colonial period and to the 1960s and the army's suspicion that the ethnic Chinese as a group were a fifth column for the Chinese Communist Party. The attacks then were as unfair as they are now, but for reasons that will be explained below, they resonate strongly in Indonesian society, especially, though not exclusively, among more conservative Muslim groups. The Soeharto government has continued a policy of discrimination against the ethnic Chinese, restricting their admission to state universities and the civil service and maintaining a ban on the use of Chinese characters, while at the same time, leaving their dominance of the Indonesian economy intact and enabling a few dozen ethnic Chinese families to amass fabulous wealth. These policies have resulted in a public image of the ethnic Chinese as rich pariahs. The irony is that with the exception of the Wanandi brothers, the main victims of this round of unrest are not members of the estimated forty extremely wealthy families whose heads have earned the appellation cukong, or tycoon, but the shopkeepers who constitute a critical part of Indonesia's middle class.
Jakarta -- The spectre of current food shortages leading to a famine throughout the island of Java has emerged as a major threat to President Suharto's regime, observers say, adding it could even cripple his hold on power.
Indonesian would have to import at least four million tonnes of rice this year to feed its 200,000,000 people, a World Bank report said. Other experts have endorsed the projections. The Bank warned there was the potential "for a serious food crisis with wide social consequences".
In a more blunt remark, a former agricultural adviser to the government told AFP: "In Indonesia, rice is the most sensitive issue and if its unavailable, there'll be revolution.'
In order to avoid any panic run on stores, Indonesian authorities have declared there are "sufficient" stocks and have quietly sought foreign help, especially that of the World Bank whose president James Wolfenson was here last month.
Indonesia is reported to have imported two million tonnes of rice in the December-March period and Japanese source say it has asked for a 400,000-tonne urgent shipment.
Diplomatic sources say Suharto's choice as vice-president, Habibie, has written to German Chancellor Helmut Kohl, asking for a million tonnes of rice from Germany.
With its currency crashing under the weight of massive unproductive debts, Indonesia is in no position to finance rice imports on a big scale, the more so since its demand is likely to push up world prices.
It is not sold on credit and the World Bank has highlighted how imports from Thailand and Vietnam had been cut off in Jenuary because Indonesia could no longer secure a credit line.
Finance Minister Ma'rie Muhammad said Monday Indonesia had sought the Bank's help but added that if it was denied, the government would go ahead and import necessary stocks at an exchange rate of 5,000 rupiah to the dollar. With rice at $300 to the tonne and a current exchange rate of around 10,000, that would be a tall order to fulfil.
Keith B. Richburg, Jakarta -- At The Cipto Mangunkusumo Central Hospital here, doctors found that they no longer could afford the specially treated plastic bags which hold blood for transfusions. So the hospital director asked staffers to scour the local markets in search of old-fashioned milk bottles that could be washed out and used instead.
In the hospital's operating rooms too, frugality is the watchword; expensive imported thread is out, catgut is in. And surgeons are being told to make more economical use of the thread when stitching up a patient. "We have to use less expensive materials and supplies," said Hermansyur Kartowisastro, the hospital's deputy director for medical care. "We are also asking the surgeons not to use so much."
In the kidney dialysis ward, $10 artificial kidney tubes no longer are thrown away after each treatment but are rinsed and reused as many as eight times for the same patient.
Indonesia is struggling to reverse a debilitating economic meltdown in which its currency lost at least 70 percent of its foreign-exchange value since last summer and the price of imported goods -- including medical supplies, equipment and drugs -- soared beyond reach.
State-run hospitals such as this sprawling facility -- one of the largest in the city -- are searching for ways to tighten their belts and adjust to the new reality. "With some creativity, we can overcome the problem," Ahmad Djojosugito, the hospital director, commented. "We have to innovate." Younger doctors -- trained in the recent years of Indonesian affluence -- became accustomed to ordering a battery of tests and X-rays before making a diagnosis. Now they are instructed to be very selective in the tests they order and to take only essential X-rays.
Ahmad was trained as a physician during Indonesia's leaner times, when supplies were short and hospitals made do on bare-bones budgets. "We have to return to the difficulties we had in the 1960s and '70s," he said. For intravenous feeding and blood transfusions, he said, "I remember using the old bottle with the tubing. I had to rinse it out and reuse it. Now we have to go back to that again."
Local newspaper reports said four people had died on the island of Bali in January because they could not continue expensive kidney dialysis treatments. Pudji Rahardjo, a physician who runs the Cipto Mangunkusumo hospital's dialysis ward, said the cost of one five-hour treatment has shot up from 150,000 rupiah ($15) to about 500,000 rupiah ($51) -- all because of the plunge in the local currency in relation to the U.S. dollar. He said regular patients complained vigorously about the cost but that most have no alternative because they depend on the weekly treatment to survive. "Maybe you can encourage your people to help us," the doctor said to an American reporter. The biggest problem, health workers say, is the high cost of medicine -- chiefly imported drugs, but also locally manufactured medicines made with some imported raw materials. At the Medica pharmacy in Jakarta, Ane, the assistant manager, said she has seen the prices for most drugs double since the economic crisis began.
At the nearby Aries pharmacy, Naomi, the assistant manager, said the price of one common antibiotic, amoxycillin, has jumped from 400 rupiah per tablet to 1,000 rupiah.
World Bank President James Wolfensohn announced during a visit here this month that the bank would provide extra funding to help Indonesia purchase drugs and basic medical supplies for its public hospitals. Wolfensohn said Indonesia's more than 200 pharmaceutical companies rely on imports for 90 percent of their materials, and he called the problem critical.
1998 The Washington Post Co. The Guardian Weekly Volume 158 Issue 8 for week ending February 22 1998, Page 19
| Environment/land disputes |
Jakarta -- Fires raged in remote Indonesian forests Wednesday as regional environmental ministers met to try to avoid a repeat of last year's choking haze which engulfed much of SE Asia.
Estimates of the number of fires burning in East Kalimantan alone ranged between 300 and 1,000 while dozens more were said to be blazing in Riau, central Sumatra.
Repeated water-bombing by aircraft and the dropping of fire- retardant chemicals had limited the scale of the problem in some of the worse hit areas of East Kalimantan, a fire-fighting official in Samarinda said. "But more fires are starting and they are spreading." he added.
Fire had already razed 14,000 hectares of forest in East Kalimantan since Jnaury, he told Antara news agency.
Centre for International Forestry Research analyst Fred Stolle said the situation would worsen without rain because of a prolonged drought as a result of the El Nino weather pattern. However the recent rainfall had minimised the risk of fires spreading in Riau, he said.
The head of a German-funded fire-fighting programme earlier said fires in East Kalimantan were already too big and widespread to contain. "It is really bad, Ludwig Schindler said. "The area is completely covered with haze, There is no way to fly. Visibility is down to 300 metres."
"The fires have escalated to the extent that makes it impossible or economically impossible to put them out. The only thing that could help now is rain." The fires were raging in a 250-km band straddling the Makaram River in central East Kalimantan, he said.
World Wild Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) Wednesday estimated the regional bill for damage caused by the Indonesian fires and the subsequent haze in 1997 was almost $1.5 billion.
Damage estimated at one billion dollars was sustained by Indonesia itself, 90 per cent of that figure in short-term health costs, the group said in a statement issued by its Jakarta office. Another 90 million dollars was lost in tourism and airport shutdowns.
Malaysia lost about 300 million dollars mainly in lost industrial production and a slump in tourism. Singapore lost 60 milllion dollars, mainly in tourism. It and Malaysia paid out a combinsed 12 million dollars for additional health care directly attributed to the choking smog which affected some 70 million people in the region, the statement said.
ASEAN enviroment ministers were holding a one-day meeting in Kuching Wednesday to discuss joint measures against the fires.
Seth Mydans, Samarinda -- Indonesia The eastern coast of Borneo, dry after a year of drought, is bursting into flame again, raising fears that a wave of choking smoke could soon blanket Southeast Asia as it did last autumn.
Desperate to survive as food shortages and bankruptcies spread in Indonesia both small farmers and plantation owners have apparently resumed their slash-and-burn land clearing despite a government ban on burning and in defiance of pleas by neighboring countries.
The fires and the continuing drought broken in much of the country only by sporadic rain showers are bringing added misery to a nation that is suffering its worst economic and political crisis in decades.
The drought has ruined crops and added to the unemployment and food shortages that are causing price riots around the country in a social parallel to last year's wildfires.
From hilltops here in Kalimantan Timur Province, plumes of smoke can be seen in every direction. As the wind shifts unpredictably, flames eat their way through the forests, driving birds and animals ahead of them. Farmers with machetes rush to cut fire breaks. Clouds of sweet smoke sting the eyes and bring an early dusk to villages.
"I was up all night fighting a fire near my home," said Badui, a farmer, as he hacked underbrush at the edges of a crackling fire north of Samarinda. "Now I'm helping my friend save his home. It was the same thing last year." At a tracking station here, brightly colored computerized satellite images show hundreds of shifting hot spots. Most are clustered here in the country's driest province. But two new clusters appeared recently in northeastern Sumatra, the other Indonesian island that was a source of the regionwide haze last year.
"If the meteorology predictions are right, the dry season may be longer than last year," said Longgena Ginting, coordinator of forestry advocacy at Walhi, an environmental lobbying group. "If that happens, I am quite sure the fires will be worse than they were last year. It really depends on the weather."
Singapore, Malaysia and the Philippines have already voiced their concern. Malaysia is particularly worried about the possibility that smoke could ruin its plans to play host to the Commonwealth Games in September.
The smog last autumn affected six Southeast Asian nations, forcing the closing of airports, contributing to ship collisions and cutting deeply into the tourism industry. It also caused widespread health problems and led to the evacuation of many foreign diplomats and executives.
The root cause of the problem has not changed, Longgena Ginting said. "In Kalimantan, the fires are mostly caused by plantations and timber estates that have started to clear land again."
The cheap clearing of land by burning will be harder than ever to stop, given the economic hardships that make it less likely that plantation owners will shift to more expensive mechanized methods.
In addition, said Charles Barber, a senior researcher for the World Resources Institute: "The government has no money now to do enforcement or oversight. This is a problem in all areas of environmental management. It's a very unfortunate confluence of events: the drought, a boom in land clearing, which never had very good oversight, and now less money to focus on what goes on out in the field.
"Combine that with a large amount of dead and dry biomass, which is lying around from incompletely burned areas from 1997, and you could have some real rough fires. It could be worse in May than it was even last September.''
| Human rights/law |
Palembang -- The LBH (Institute for Legal Aid) regional offices in Palembang were attacked at 1 PM today (26/2) by a group of unknown assailants. Stones and bottles of beer were thrown, causing some damage to the facilities, mostly broken windows. The LBH's director in Palembang told Kompas that " LBH in Palembang has been releasing very critical statements about the locality's record on human rights, democracy, the environment and politics in general." He added that "We don't know who is responsible for today's attack but there is no doubt that it comes in the wake of our activities. It could well be that it is someone who was angered by a recent court ruling in a case brought forward by LBH."
Two LBH employees in Palembang see a link between today's events and the covert terror tactics that have been occurring over the past two weeks. For instance, last week someone dumped trash and human faeces in the LBH front yard. Only a couple of days ago a dead rat inside a plastic bag was thrown against a window on the ground floor. When asked why the LBH had not reported these events to the police, the LBH employees said they did not think the problems were serious enough to warrant a police report.
YLBHI under watch
Meanwhile, the YLBHI's headquarters in Jakarta are being guarded by the police in full riot gear. Several trucks were parked in the vicinity of the YLBHI offices. The chairman of YLBHI's board of advisors, Bambang Widjojanto, was asked by reporters to confirm whether this concentration of police forces could be linked to the fact that members of the Partai Demokrasi Indonesia (PDI) and the outlawed trade-union SBSI have recently sought refuge and protection at the YLBHI's headquarters. "They came into our offices because they believe they have been put under surveillance by the authorities," said Widjojanto. "I don't know what their intentions are, whether they are thinking of staging a demonstration. What is certain, is that there is an increasing concentration of security forces outside our offices."
According to a lawyer working for the YLBHI, they tried to discuss the situation with those people who alleged to be members of the security forces, but the latter refused to show their identifications and hence the lawyers decided to stop the talks. In response, the security forces decided to retreat from the immediate vicinity of the YLBHI offices.
Jakarta - Demonstrations and riots to protest the increase in the nine basic needs and demands for political reform which have erupted in several cities and regions during the period over the month of January up to 19 February l998 have resulted in 3 deaths, 921 detentions and 14 disappearances. Thus data obtained as a result of investigation issued by the Indonesian Legal Aid Foundation (YLBHI), The Independent Committee to Monitor General Elections (KIPP), and the Foundation for Social Studies and Advocacy (ELSAM), Wednesday, Feb. 18.
The joint statement issued by Bambang Widjojanto, SH (YLBHI), Mulyana W. Kusumah (KIPP) and Aderito de Jesus Soares (ELSAM) is a compilation of data obtained from the wage of "mass riots" or mass anger. Data was obtained from Sentani, in Irian Jaya, Banyuwangi, Bondowoso, Tuban, Pasuruan, Jember, Unjungpandang, Palu, Ende, Bima, Central Lombok, Cirebon, Padelangan, Subang, Indramayu, Jatiwangi, Sumedang, Bandung to Buleleng in Bali.
According to this statement, mass anger was caused by the economic crisis which has seriously emburdened the majority of the people, beginning with the increase in the price of basic needs, the "disappearance" of goods from the market, mass lay- off, shortened working hours and salaries which are rapidly losing their real value, all of which are concrete problems faced by the people.
The joint agreement with the IMF and the introduction of the Currency Board System, the statement continued, only serve to rescue and protect the interests of the large economic actors and ignore the impact on the majority of ordinary people.
However, the statement continued, government reactions have become increasingly repressive. The attempt to implement Act No.5/PNPS/l963 as a justification for detention and dealing with peaceful demonstrations by various social groups, such as the Red-White Brigade in Jakarta, child laborers in the Global March campaign, or the FPPMG activists in Garut, kidnaping of 14 activists, and the threat to "shoot on the spot", as well as the tapping of telephone lines by the police, are manifestations of the government's repressive actioins in dealing with social protest and unrest.
Furthermore the religious regimentation revealed in the statement by the Minister of Religion, Tarmizi Taher, about 20 million people descended from the PKI (Indonesian Communist Party) roaming around, pushes the Indonesian people, who have already lost their jobs or whose income is eroding, into a corner.
At the end of their statement, YLBHI, KIPP and ELSAM reiterated that human rights in Indonesia are being violated, in particular, the three basic freedoms of citizens, first, the right to freedom of opinion, freedom to organize and associate; secondly, the disappearance of the guarantee for civil security of citizens, such as the freedom from arbitrary detention, freedom from torture, freedom from kidnaping (disappearance), and freedom from fear; thirdly, the failure of the government to facilitate the people's economic rights.
Detailed data on arrests, detention, kidnaping and violence from January to 19 February l998 issued by YLBHI, KIPP, ELSAM state the following: Arrest and Detention in Bondowoso (9 people), Banyuwangi (29 people), Tuban (104), Pasuruan (28), Ende NTB (9), Palu (34), Jember (5), Bima NTB (15), Jakarta (140), Cirebon (30), Central Lombok (10), Padelangan (16), Bogor (22), Buleleng-Singaraja (12), Subang (198), Indramayu (1), Jatiwangi (44), Sumedang (28), Bandung (3), Lemahabang (5), Brebes (20), Pamanukan (145), Bandung (5).
Kidnaping: Drs. Lucas da Costa (Lecturer, Unwiku), 6 students from East Timor taken by the military from their lodgings in Surabaya; Desmond J. Mahesa (Nusantara Legal Aid Foundation), and Pius Lustrilanang (Secretary General, Aldera); 5 students of the Garut Students Communication Forum: Deri, Maruli, Wanto, Chepi, and Gunawan. Shootings in Brebes (Losari): 2 dead: Darmani (22) and Amran (22), and 6 seriously wounded. Cirebon: 1 dead, 3 seriously wounded. Bekasi: one student seriously wounded.
Three women activists of the group of "Suara Ibu Peduli" who were organising and participating in a peaceful demonstration in front of the Hotel indonesia, Jakarta, were arrested by the Police and taken into the custody of Polda Jaya, Monday, 23 Feb, 1998.
The three women are Dr. Karlina Leksono Supeli, Gadis Arivia Effendi, and Wilasih Noviana.
About 50 women, mostly housewives, joined the group to protest against the increase in the price of milk. They were also expressing concern on the current economic situation.
It is not yet known what charges they will face.
The Indonesian Legal Aid and Human Rights Association, PBHI, has sent a letter to Major-General Hamami Nata, Jakarta Police chief, strongly protesting against the arrests.
The Association said that the peaceful protest which was organised by a group called The Voice of Concerned Mothers was forcibly dispersed was protesting about the soaring prices of the nine basic commodities as well as rising costs of medical treatment and contraceptives.
The letter stated that the economic situation is now extremely grave and was being felt by all sections of society, particularly women.
It said that it was the responsibility of the state to guarantee the rights of all its citizens, among which was the right of women and children to decent health and welfare. It is totally within their right for women to give expression to their aspirations by means of peaceful demonstrations. The right of association and assembly are central to people's basic rights.
If women can be arrested simply for expressing their concern about very concrete problems, it is clear that the state authorities are responsible for a number of human rights violations.
Meanwhile, according to an AFP report about the women's demonstration, Tuty Heriaty, a lecturer at the University of Indonesia, read a statement which said that the current dire economic crisis was caused by a "government which does not pay attention to the interests of the common people and which represses their voices. We do not want to live in a culture of intimidation and manipulation."
Another protester, Tineke Arif, said the group represented about fifty mothers but acted on behalf of all Indonesian women, mothers and housewives. Elsewhere in Jakarta, two dozen activists from SIAGA, Solidarity for Amien and Mega, staged a brief, silent demonstration for about 30 minutes at the main entrance to a central arts centre where some of them study.
The group clutched a long strip of black cloth and held their fists in the air. Police in the area directing the traffic allowed the demonstration to proceed and the protesters left peacefully afterwards.
"This is a form of protest and a reflection of our peaking grievance over the continuously worsening economic and political conditions in Indonesia," a SIAGA statement said.
At a time when Indonesia is in the grip of a grave economic and political crisis, President Suharto, the Indonesian dictator, with the support of ABRI, the Indonesian armed forces, is further intensifying the level of repression in his determination to stay in power at all costs. Hundreds have been arrested and many face charges for "engaging in political activities" and a penalty of up to five years.
As never before, Indonesia's pro-democracy movement needs international solidarity to confront the dictatorship and exercise their democratic right to challenge Suharto, after 32 years of despotic rule.
If western powers really want to help resolve Indonesia's economic crisis, they should stop trying to persuade Suharto to toe the IMF line. Instead, they should boldly condemn the current wave of repression, declare a moratorium on all arms sales to Indonesia, support the pro-democracy movement and thus contribute towards freeing Indonesia from Suharto's brutal reign of terror.
The crisis deepens
Civil society's responseThe economic crisis is worsening by the day. The national currency has lost more than 70 per cent of its value since last July. Prices are skyrocketing. Thousands of factories and businesses have closed. Millions have been thrown out of work. Lack of food is threatening in many parts of the country. Deep- rooted corruption, nepotism and cronyism have taken the economy to the brink of catastrophe. The banking system is paralysed, the country is burdened with a foreign debt of more than $140 billion. The absence of political rights and basic human rights under Suharto's New Order has made it impossible for people to challenge the dictator and his ruling clique by democratic means. The general elections are rigged and democratic political activity is banned. There is no freedom of assembly or association, freedom of speech or the right to set up independent parties, trade unions or other organisations. There is no protection of the person against arbitrary arrest. Unless the country explodes in protest in the next few weeks, Suharto will be re-appointed for a seventh term on 11 March by an assembly called the MPR, the majority of whose members were appointed by Suharto, with the remainder representing parties that are totally loyal to his regime. Suharto and his family have amassed colossal wealth, thought to exceed $40 billion. They now maintain a grip on critical aspects of state policy, in particular decisions for handling the economic crisis in a way that would serve their interests to the detriment of the common people. It is now accepted by virtually all commentators right across the political spectrum that the economic crisis cannot be resolved without fundamental political reforms and an end to Suharto's rule.
The regime's response: increased repressionPro-democracy groups that have campaigned for political change for years now raise three demands: lower prices, an end to corruption and cronyism and an end to rule by Suharto. Students and democratic groups are demonstrating in many parts of the country around these demands. In some places, thousands have taken to the streets in support of these demands. The manipulated presidential procedure makes it impossible for anyone other than Suharto to be chosen. However, several figures have decided to challenge the election from outside the system. Megawati Sukarnoputri who chairs the unrecognised, mass-based PDI has put herself forward as a candidate for the presidency. Amien Rais, head of the 25-million strong Muhammadiyah, has also put himself forward as a candidate. A former cabinet minister, Emil Salim, has put himself forward as a candidate for the vice- presidency. All these nominations have wide support among the general public. However, being unable to contest in the normal way, they must depend on mobilising support in meetings and on the streets. In many cities and towns, there have been eruptions of social unrest prompted by the catastrophic fall in living standards, rising prices and mass dismissals. Some of the unrest has been directed against the security forces or officialdom with whom local inhabitants have long-standing grievances . Many are food riots, targeted against shops which are usually Chinese because this ethnic group predominates in the nation's commerce. By means of subtle provocation, some elements within the regime have sought to give this social unrest a racist edge. By blaming the Chinese for the crisis, they hope to deflect attention from Suharto and his cronies who must be held accountable for the catastrophe.
In face of growing political opposition and social unrest, Suharto and ABRI have cranked up their apparatus of repression in order to suppress the growing challenge to Suharto's rule.
At the beginning of February, large-scale military exercises were held in Jakarta in order to "secure" the MPR session. Thousands of troops fanned out across the capital, backed up by helicopters, armoured vehicles and police dogs. We have photographic evidence that British-made water cannon were used in the exercises. The Jakarta military commander, Major-General Sjafrie Sjamsoeddin, has formed a special Operational Command (Koops- Jaya) to "safeguard" the MPR Session with himself as commander and the Jakarta chief-of-police as his deputy. They have 50,000 troops at their disposal. [Forum Keadilan, 23 February 1998] Suharto has issued instructions to ABRI "to crack down on protesters wanting to trigger national disintegration". Other top army generals have made equally belligerent threats, warning opposition groups of stern measures if they take to the streets. They have threatened to "cut down" and "slice to pieces" defenceless demonstrators in their determination to quell protest. On 18 February, the Jakarta military commander declared that all demonstrations in the capital were banned until one week after the MPR Session. "I will not permit any groups to take to the streets. If they insist on doing so, we will take strong measures." [Kompas, 19 February] No meetings, seminars or other gatherings will be permitted during the weeks before and after the MPR Session. Hundreds of people have already been arrested. Human rights groups estimate that by mid February, more than seven hundred people had been rounded up. The following figures are far from complete: East Java (152), Pamanukan, West Java (266), Losari, West Java (6), Donggala, Central Sulawesi (34), Pasuruan, East Java (30), Bima, NTT (15), Ende, NTT (56), Kendari, Central Sulawesi (37), Praya, Lombok (8), Garut, West Java (5) and Jakarta (146). Fifty people were arrested during a child labour march in Jakarta. All were released but 35 will be charged. Two pro-democracy activists disappeared from their homes in early February and are still unaccounted for. At least five people have been shot dead in security operations against social unrest. A number of extremely severe laws are being used against demonstrators. Besides the anti-subversion law and the hate- sowing articles of the Criminal Code, a law enacted in 1969, Law 5/1969, is being used to charge peaceful demonstrators. Under this law, people may be charged "for engaging in political activities" and face a penalty of up to five years. To set an example, of the 146 people arrested during a peaceful demonstration in Jakarta on 11 February, 128 people will be charged for political offences of whom 123 will be charged under Law 5/1969 and five under the even more draconian anti-subversion law. The police have started phone tapping and cutting phone connections of pro-democracy. activists. In a meeting with cellular phone company executives, the Jakarta chief-of-police, Major General Hamami Nata, demanded access to intercept and cut off phone-calls deemed to be "rabble-rousing". [Jakarta Post, 13 February] The police have announced a "shoot-on-sight" policy against "rioters" in an attempt to quell widespread anger at plummeting living standards. This policy could equally be used against demonstrators, given the overlap of demands and actions by spontaneous outbursts of social unrest and organised pro- democracy street protests.
| Politics |
Keith B. Richburg, Jakarta -- Indonesia-Indonesia, the world's fourth-most populous country, is sliding steadily toward economic and social chaos.
There are outbreaks of rioting and looting daily in the towns and villages of Java and Sumatra, targeted at suspected hoarders and profiteers. The country's ethnic Chinese minority lives in fear, with some seeking refuge in police stations and army barracks, others seeking passports to leave. A severe drought has left food in short supply, while in some areas the distribution system has broken down. Unemployment is mounting. Factories no longer function. People don't even bother paying their electricity bills.
The fate of 200 million people -- as well as many of Asia's key financial markets -- depends solely on the whims and reactions of one man: President Suharto.
After 32 years in power, Suharto remains an enigma not only to the outside world, but also to his own people. His leadership style is aloof. He is rarely interviewed, and when he speaks in public, the former general is given to cryptic comments that analysts spend days or weeks trying to decipher.
He is pulled between competing demands and forces -- his relatives with their multiple business interests; his team of Western-trained economic technocrats known as the "Berkeley Mafia"; the powerful military that props up his regime; and the new breed of "economic nationalists" with an Indonesia-first agenda. Yet Suharto keeps his own counsel, almost never revealing his opinions.
One of the paradoxes of Indonesia's current conundrum is that while Suharto is facing the gravest challenge ever to his hold on the country, he is also at the peak of his power. Next month he is set to be appointed to a seventh five-year term by a 1,000- member assembly picked largely by him. Democracy backers, such as Megawati Sukarnoputri, have been marginalized. The military, the only force capable of removing Suharto, is more firmly under his sway than ever. Even his critics -- now more brazen than ever in calling for Suharto to step down -- concede they can think of no credible alternative.
"We don't have a credible opposition that can replace him immediately," said Jusuf Wanandi of the Center for Strategic and International Studies.
"He is the highest military commander," said Laksamana Sukardi, an economist and consultant aligned with the opposition. "He decides the promotions and appointments in the army. He appoints the central bank governor, the boards of directors of state-owned companies; he decides who will be chairman of the securities and exchange commission; he appoints the judges, the members of parliament. . . . Under normal circumstances, nobody has any chance to challenge Suharto."
For many Indonesian and foreign analysts, that paradox has led to the current stalemate. With Indonesia's predicament now viewed as more a crisis of confidence than a problem of economics, the country cannot hope to begin reviving its battered financial sector and reversing the downward spiral as long as Suharto and Company -- his relatives, friends and business associates -- remain in charge. But without Suharto, most see only more chaos, more uncertainty, and perhaps even more bloodshed and another violent upheaval similar to the slaughter of 1965, in which thousands of ethnic Chinese and communist sympathizers were slain.
The most startling thing to emerge in three weeks of interviews with a cross-section of people here and around the region, including academics, political activists, Asian and Western diplomats, regional financial analysts, journalists and others -- is that the overall view of the country's future is universally gloomy. Many here seem convinced that Suharto has entered the endgame of his rule; either politics or his own mortality will see to that. No one is certain how or when the end will come, but few think it will come smoothly or peacefully.
"This is a very dire situation we are facing," said Wanandi. "It's more than 50 percent gloomy. If the misery deepens, then 'people power' can still happen here. But it will be anarchy, not by design."
"Is the situation going to spiral out of control?" a Western diplomat here asked rhetorically. "We can't answer that." Suharto is making no concession to mortality. Preparing to start his next five-year term, he is believed to be making no plans to step down or even to begin grooming a potential successor. He is likely to name his longtime friend, B. J. Habibie, the research and technology minister, as vice president, but most analysts believe that Habibie will remain in Suharto's shadow and that the appointment will not mean that Habibie is to be his successor.
On the contrary, one Western diplomat said a presidential intimate told him recently that Suharto is now busily mapping out his plans for the next five years. He is taking seriously the idea of some modest adjustments in the closed political system, the aide said. But the changes would come in 2001.
Analysts and scholars here see only three possibilities for change -- even while conceding that at the moment, none of them looks likely. Those scenarios include:
A People Power uprising, similar to the popular revolt that ousted longtime Philippine dictator Ferdinand E. Marcos. There have been scattered anti-Suharto protests in Jakarta, but they are small, sporadic and easily outnumbered and contained by the police and military. Also, academics here point out that it took People Power more than two years to emerge as a potent force in Manila -- from the assassination of opposition leader Benigno S. Aquino in late 1983 until the revolt in February 1986.
Whether anything like that can happen here remains problematic. For one thing, a successful People Power movement would require a leader to galvanize the angry masses. Indonesians are angry and frustrated, but as a Western diplomat said, "It's leaderless. ...What you have is scattered unrest, but not a situation that's out of control."
But as Laksamana said, "In a crisis situation -- when there's a lot of unemployment, people are hungry, crime is increasing -- the normal rules don't apply. Anything can happen."
The emergence of an alternative. Many here have pointed to Sukarnoputri, daughter of Indonesia's independence hero and first president, Sukarno, as one who could mobilize crowds, if not by her own personality then by the magic of her family name and the aura of leadership that surrounds her. She gave a fiery speech last month calling for Suharto to go and offering to be a candidate. But Sukarnoputri has been effectively marginalized from the system. Her supporters insist that Sukarnoputri does have a plan but that it consists of waiting for the right moment to emerge. To move any sooner, they say, would only put her at risk of removal -- similar to the way Burma placed Aung San Suu Kyi under house arrest and removed her from effective influence for years.
A military move against Suharto. Most analysts believe that if there is any change at the top in Indonesia, it will come not from the streets and not from Sukarnoputri, but from the powerful armed forces. The military is still the most cohesive institution in the country and by any measure the final arbiter of power here. There are also believed to be a large number of officers, particularly in the lower ranks, who are reform-minded and would like to see a more open system, if not a Western-style democracy.
But the military for the moment remains firmly on Suharto's side. The reasons are varied. The military's top officers support Suharto because they owe their positions to him. The top officers have almost all served as Suharto's adjutants, or assistants, and as political scientist Dewi Fortuna Anwar said, "Suharto doesn't listen to his adjutants." The military also still regards "The Old Man" with awe and respect because of his age and accomplishments.
If a military move against Suharto is unlikely, analysts say, the key reason may be that the military is divided along lines of personal loyalty. There is no one the officers could unite behind as a replacement for Suharto.
For example, Suharto's son-in-law, Prabowo, now heads the special forces unit and is believed to have his own agenda, making it unlikely he would back a takeover bid by the obvious candidate, Wiranto, the new armed forces commander and a former Suharto aide.
Those fault lines were exposed during a recent behind-the-scenes struggle over the endorsement of a new vice president, with some in the military backing the incumbent, Try Sutrisno, and others pushing for Habibie.
"It's all personalities, and it's very shallow," said a Western embassy's military attache. "There's no ideology."
Jakarta -- The ruling Golkar's executive board has warned its MPs that they face unspecified disciplinary action if they nominated anyone other than Research and Technology Minister B. J. Habibie at next week's presidential and vice-presidential election, newspapers here reported yesterday.
Executive board co-chairman Abdul Gafur spoke of stern action if members broke ranks with the party's move to back the controversial Dr Habibie as President Suharto's running mate for the 1998-to-2003 term at next week's meeting of the People's Consultative Assembly (MPR).
The Indonesian Observer and newspaper quoted him as saying that the 45-member board "understood" that not all of Golkar's cadres might want Dr Habibie to assume the vice-presidency.
Several senior Golkar cadres have openly rejected the nomination of Dr Habibie, preferring instead to support former Population and Environment Minister Emil Salim, who declared his decision to stand for the post on Feb 16.
One cadre, Transmigration and Resettlement Minister Siswono Yudohusodo, has criticised Dr Habibie for having no "sense of crisis" because he intends to continue spending on the state- owned aircraft industry despite the country facing its worst economic crisis in decades.
Environment Minister Sarwono Kusumaatmadja, also a Golkar cadre, has been quoted as saying that Dr Emil, his predecessor, was an ideal leader.
Dr Emil told reporters yesterday he would press ahead with his bid despite doubts that he will even be able to formally stand as a candidate.
He said his candidacy was a "moral movement" and that support for his nomination "should not be seen as opposing the government".
Mr Abdul Gafur, who is Deputy Parliamentary Speaker, was confident, however, that the 1,000-member MPR would elect Dr Habibie unanimously.
"I think there will be no differences of opinion because there is only one candidate," he said.
Dr Habibie is expected to walk into the position as all factions making up the MPR -- Golkar, the armed forces (Abri), the United Development Party, Indonesian Democratic Party and regional representatives -- have all endorsed his candidacy.
Golkar chairman Harmoko, who will chair the MPR session, has also been quoted as saying that none of the party's members would dare oppose the nomination of Dr Habibie. "I will ensure there will be no interruptions from Golkar members.
Golkar members will always follow the regulations and be loyal," the Antara national news agency quoted him saying.
He said he had yet to decide how Golkar members should be punished if they raised any objections to matters discussed at the MPR session.
"Again I repeat -- we will nominate Suharto and B. J. Habibie as candidates for the presidency and vice-presidency.
"There will be no other names. All Golkar cadres will support the decision," he said.
Armed forces chief General Wiranto has also said the military would not waver in its support for Dr Habibie.
"A decision of Abri today will remain the same tomorrow, the day after tomorrow, and hereafter," he told reporters.
"You should not question the armed forces' stance on Habibie's nomination anymore."
Peter Hartcher -- One of Indonesia's key Islamic leaders has promised to lead a "people's power" mass movement to unseat President Soeharto unless his regime can solve the country's crisis within a year.
The unprecedented ultimatum was delivered by Dr Amien Rais, the widely respected leader of Indonesia's second-biggest Muslim group, the moderate, 28 million strong Muhammadiyah movement.
Dr Amien announced his position -- the first threat of direct action against the Soeharto regime from any significant community leader -- in an interview with The Australian Financial Review in his Jakarta headquarters.
"The Indonesian people will give President Soeharto a last chance when he is formally installed for another term of office next month after 32 years in power," he said.
"But if, one year later, he can't deliver, the people will find their own solution. I am imagining a peaceful people's power movement, led by an informal group of trusted leaders of the people. "The country in a crisis will divide naturally into two groups: those who want change, and those who want the status quo. We will see which group is stronger.
"If the group that wants change is stronger, then Indonesia will see a different future. The hungry and the angry people will direct their anger against the Government and there won't be any force that can defeat the will of the people."
Asked whether he would lead such a movement, he replied: "I hope so. I don't want to talk big and then go into hiding."
Last month Dr Amien proposed a loose alliance for "political reform" with the other major Muslim group in Indonesia, the Nahdlathul Ulama (NU), with 38 million members. The NU leader, Mr Abdurrahman Wahid, said that the nature of the alliance needed to be clarified, but that "we feel the same need for political reform".
These men are the most important community leaders in the country. But while Mr Wahid has been sidelined with a stroke in recent weeks, Dr Amien is very active.
Dr Amien also invited the unseated opposition leader, Ms Megawati Soekarnoputri, to join the alliance -- an offer she accepted.
This trio would seem to be the likely basis for any people's power movement.
It was the non-violent mass rallying of citizens in the Philippines that finally brought down the Marcos regime, and this example of so-called "people's power" seems to serve as a model for Dr Amien.
Dr Amien predicted that the armed forces, the strongest of Indonesia's institutions and ultimate arbiter of political power, would eventually abandon the Soeharto Government in the face of a people's power movement.
Dr Amien, a US-educated sociologist, said that he had held "long and frank discussions" with the leadership of the army.
"I bet they will take a neutral position. When the will to change is very strong, they will probably go along with the people and abandon their support for the 'ancien regime'," he said.
" It seems to me that we share a lot in common; our vision is the same. There is no serious difference when we discuss the future of the country. I always tell them they have to do first things first -- they must not forget the hungry people need to be fed first."
Dr Amien believes that it might still be possible for President Soeharto, Asia's longest-ruling leader, to stabilise Indonesia's crisis.
However, the situation in Indonesia is still deteriorating as a credit crunch forces factories to close and throws workers on to the streets.
And the sharp deterioration of the rupiah is feeding high inflation, with the price of food, fuel and other basic commodities likely to keep rising in coming months.
Dr Amien said: "The existence of the next Soeharto regime will depend very much on its ability to feed the people.
"If he succeeds, if he can build a clean government and restore the confidence of the people, the situation will be much better.
"But the objective monetary situation will put very strong pressure on Soeharto to stand down if his efforts to overcome the crisis fail. He is racing against time."
Keith B. Richburg, Jakarta, For some, B.J. Habibie is a visionary, an ardent economic nationalist and the very image of a thoroughly modern Muslim intellectual. He inspires millions with his grand plan to transform Indonesia into a leader of industry and high technology for the next century.
For others, B.J. Habibie is a dangerous eccentric who uses his proximity to an aging president to push his economic theories and a raft of grandiose, ill-conceived plans that are a drain on the national treasury.
Those two opposing views, however extreme, neatly summarize the intense feelings engendered among supporters and detractors of the man who may become Indonesia's next vice president.
"Habibie is a very divisive presence, not only in society but also within the military," said an Asian diplomat with long experience here.
For years, critics could dismiss Habibie, Indonesia's research and technology minister, as a bit of an oddball and a maverick, albeit an influential one who has President Suharto's ear. But now Habibie, 61, stands on the verge of becoming Suharto's number-two man -- and the country's next president if Suharto, 76, is unable to complete his next five-year term.
Today, Habibie moved a step closer to the vice presidential post that had eluded him in 1993. The leadership of Indonesia's powerful armed forces this morning officially threw its support behind Habibie for vice president, and the outgoing commander, Gen. Feisal Tanjung, praised him as "the best figure to accompany . . . Suharto in carrying out the duties of the nation and the state for the next five years."
While Suharto has yet to make his own choice public, Habibie already had won the endorsement of Indonesia's three officially sanctioned political parties and the country's 27 appointed governors. But the support of the military, which enjoys a constitutionally enshrined role in politics, is crucial because it is considered the country's most cohesive institution and the final arbiter of power.
Because Habibie had never worn a uniform, the level of support for him within the military's ranks had remained a large question. But Feisal said today that Habibie's lack of a military background is not a factor. "Abri has never considered the background of the candidates, whether or not they are civilian or military," he said, using the term by which the armed forces are known. "For Abri, what is most important is the best candidate."
"I think Minister Habibie is a shoo-in now," said Eugene Galbraith, head of research in Hong Kong for the securities firm ABN Amro Asia Ltd., who spent 16 years in Indonesia and is considered an expert on the country.
"It's a terrible decision," Galbraith said. "He's venal and corrupt, but he gives the impression of being a visionary. . . . He's kind of a proven spendthrift. He's someone who doesn't have very good political instincts in terms of forging coalitions and building a consensus."
But Dewi Fortuna Anwar, a political scientist with the Indonesian Institute of Sciences and an admitted fan of Habibie, said: "I think he's been given an unfair reading. I think a lot of the younger generation will support him because of his vision. He does have the vision, and I think he does excite a lot of people in that way."
One of Habibie's more controversial moves was using his clout with Suharto to force the military to purchase some components from "strategic industries" that Habibie himself controls. That perceived interference in Abri's procurement process is believed to have earned him the permanent antagonism of some key generals. In addition, Suharto in 1990 placed Habibie at the head of a new group called the Indonesian Association of Muslim Intellectuals. The group has given the minister a broad base of support for his unconventional economic theories -- often called nationalist economics, or simply "Habibienomics."
"There's an ideological element to it," said an Asian diplomat, explaining the core of Habibie's support and the unlikely and sometimes disparate coalition of Islamic fundamentalists and urban intellectuals who back him. "There's the attraction to high technology as a way to counter the West."
He also said many indigenous Indonesians support special government breaks for their businesses to counter the perceived special privileges enjoyed by the country's ethnic Chinese minority, who control 70 percent of private wealth here. "They want to put the Chinese in their place," the diplomat said.
Habibie's Muslim power base, however, is seen in some circles as a liability. The armed forces -- which are decidedly secular -- are suspicious of Islam as a political force in Indonesia, the world's most populous Muslim nation.
"Among the older generation, anything smacking of Islam is suspect," said Anwar, the political scientist. But she added that "Indonesia is not going to be an Islamic country," and in her view, a future president Habibie might be confident enough to allow greater democracy in what is now a largely autocratic state.
But Habibie may not make it that far. Suharto, set to be reelected for a seventh consecutive five-year term next month, has shown no indication of stepping down. In fact, observers say, Suharto is already busy mapping out measures and reforms extending well into his term.
"The only spin that could be put on Habibie is that this is an act of consummate political cynicism [by Suharto]: 'The alternative is so bad, you have to put up with me,' " Galbraith said. "If I were Suharto, appointing Habibie may not be that bad an idea."
But Habibie's influence always has come not from the positions he has held but from his closeness to Suharto, whom he publicly has said he regards as a father. Habibie reportedly refers to Suharto with a mixture of chumminess and obsequiousness, calling him "SGS," which stands for "Super Genius Suharto."
The unlikely friendship between the president and ex-general and the German-trained engineer began more than four decades ago, when Suharto was a young officer serving with a unit in Sulawesi, just across the road from where Habibie's family lived. The young boy and the officer became close, especially after Habibie's father died when the boy was 13.
Habibie worked with a German aircraft firm in the 1960s and 1970s -- rising to become vice president for applied technology -- and returned to Indonesia, according to popular accounts, only at Suharto's request.
Habibie took over the government's research and technology portfolio and used it to pursue his grand scheme of transforming Indonesia -- always with Suharto's tacit backing. His 10 major projects, grouped under the heading "strategic industries," include the state-owned IPTN aircraft manufacturer, a steel refinery and various defense-related industries.
Habibie became the government's most vocal and visible counterweight to Suharto's economic technocrats -- the mostly Western-trained economists and academics who have guided Indonesian economic policy for more than 20 years from the Finance Ministry and the central bank.
Habibie sees the technocrats as small thinkers who have allowed Indonesia to be exploited by foreign capital and left at the mercy of overseas markets. Their push for more open markets, less government intervention in the economy, lower tariffs and more liberalization have, in his view, widened the gap between rich and poor and been detrimental to the Muslim majority.
But Indonesia's current economic crisis, which sent the currency into a free fall, has caused the technocrats to quickly fall out of favor. They negotiated, and pushed Suharto to sign, the International Monetary Fund bailout agreement. The $43 billion pact seeks to open the economy further and eliminate state subsidies to some of Habibie's pet projects as well as to the national car company run by Suharto's son Tommy.
But Suharto is said to be growing impatient that the plan has not yet shored up the battered currency nor led to an economic turnaround. The firing this week of the central bank governor, Sudradjad Djiwandono, was seen here as another sign that Habibie and the economic nationalists are in the ascendancy.
David Jenkins -- As Indonesian street demonstrations go, it may not have seemed much to write home about. A couple of dozen young men, some with their baseball caps worn backwards, milling about under the tamarind trees, shouting abuse at the occupants of a nearby office block and holding up placards painted on white, pink and pale blue cardboard.
This, however, was no ordinary rally. The demonstrators were from Muslim youth organisations and the message on their posters was enough to send a chill up the spine of Indonesia's small but increasingly vulnerable ethnic Chinese community.
"CSIS, go to hell!" said one placard, carefully lettered in English and referring to the Centre for Strategic and International Studies, a Jakarta think-tank headed by a group of formerly well-connected Chinese Catholic intellectuals.
"CSIS -- Parasite", said another. "Sofjan Wanandi -- pengkhianat [traitor]," said a third, zeroing in on a powerful ethnic Chinese businessman who is said to have moved assets offshore in the current economic crisis.
As Indonesia prepares for the March 11 re-election of President Soeharto and the nation braces for further food riots, the political mood has turned ugly.
In recent weeks, racial vilification, usually kept strictly in check, has come into play, apparently with a nod from those in high office, threatening the nation's fragile ethnic harmony.
President Soeharto, 76, has the votes sewn up in the 1,000-strong People's Consultative Assembly (MPR) and is set to be returned unopposed for a seventh consecutive five-year term.
But the fight has been on in earnest for the presidential succession -- and with it the power and the spoils that will accrue to the man who will find himself running the world's fourth most populous nation should the President die or become incapacitated.
Many Indonesians would have been happy to have the incumbent Vice-President, General Try Sutrisno, serve a second five-year term.
Try, they reason, may not be an Indonesian Einstein or especially dynamic. But he is well enough liked, acceptable in army and civilian circles, acceptable to most Muslims and to Christians, acceptable to pribumi (indigenous) Indonesians and to the ethnic Chinese (non-pri) community and acceptable internationally. As time passed, however, it became apparent that Soeharto wasn't simply flying kites when he indicated that he wanted the controversial Research and Technology Minister, Dr B.J. Habibie, 61, to be his vice-president. Soeharto, a proud and stubborn man, has not forgotten that Try was foisted on him by the Armed Forces (ABRI) in 1993, when the then Defence Minister, General Benny Moerdani, was a formidable presence in Indonesian politics.
Besides, Soeharto has always had a soft spot for Habibie, whom he has known since 1950, when Habibie was a clever and precocious 13-year-old in Ujung Pandang (Makassar).
This week, after some resistance, the 75-strong ABRI group in the MPR came out in support of Habibie's nomination as vice- president, joining the other four factions in the assembly and making his election a foregone conclusion.
The prospect of an economic nationalist such as Habibie stepping into the presidential shoes is one that fills many Indonesians -- and many foreigners - with dismay.
No-one doubts that the voluble and excitable research minister is able enough in his own field; he studied aeronautical engineering in West Germany and ended up as director of technology at Messerschmitt-Bolkow-Blohm.
But his grandiose plans for an Indonesian aerospace industry have cost the country billions and his grasp of economics has been brought into question. The man who gave the aircraft industry the Habibie Factor, the Habibie Theorem and the Habibie Method has come up with an interest rate reduction strategy called zig-zag economics.
Nor is that all. Habibie has been a central player in an Islamic revival movement that has disturbed many of the nation's minority groups, especially the Christians and the ethnic Chinese.
A civilian with no independent power base, Habibie would come under intense pressure from Indonesia's generals were Soeharto to disappear from the scene. He owes his position to Soeharto, just as the mercurial Dr Subandrio, Indonesia's pre-1965 foreign minister, owed his position to President Sukarno.
Nevertheless, it has suited one or two in the army whose prospects would be dim under a Try presidency to throw their weight behind the research minister, at least for the time being.
The anti-Wanandi demonstration needs to be seen in that light. The aim was to establish a link between Try Sutrisno, Benny Moerdani, Sofjan Wanandi and the ethnic Chinese in an effort to undermine Try.
That goal was easily achieved. The Indonesian media -- especially Islamic publications such as Ummat and Republika -- devoted page after page to the demonstrations, reminding readers that Try had been linked to bloody crackdowns on Muslims in Jakarta and southern Sumatra in the 1980s and that CSIS was set up by generals known for their deep-seated hostility towards political Islam.
They suggested that Moerdani, who hangs his hat at CSIS, is the dalang (puppeteer) behind Try. They raked over claims that CSIS and its patrons were associated with the 1973 unified national Marriage Bill, which was seen as anti-Islam.
They drew a link between CSIS and the destructive anti-Japanese and anti-government riots that rocked Jakarta in 1974. They implied that army intelligence officers intent on demonising Islam -- not Muslim extremists -- were behind the highjacking of a Garuda DC-9 in 1980.
One way or another, the anti-CSIS, anti-Moerdani, anti-Try moves proved deeply satisfying to Muslims who had been sidelined during the early years of the Soeharto presidency but who are now enjoying their time in the sun.
They did not please General Wiranto, 50, the well-regarded leader of Indonesia's new generation of military officers and a man who this week moved up from his job as Army Chief of Staff to become Commander of the 475,000-strong Armed Forces.
Far from it. Appalled by the demonstration outside CSIS, Wiranto is said to have telephoned the police chief and urged him to secure both the building and its occupants. He made a point of reminding the nation that it was essential to avoid so-called SARA issues -- Indonesian shorthand for anything which might trigger an upsurge in inter-ethnic, inter-religious, inter-class or "inter-group" hostility.
Lieutenant General Prabowo Subianto, the fast-rising son-in-law of Soeharto, has now added his voice to that chorus, saying yesterday that the army does not discriminate between indigenous and non-indigenous Indonesians. He made the comment as Human Rights Watch, a New York-based group, said it believed that senior government and military officials had fuelled anti-Chinese sentiment.
For Indonesia, these are dangerous days and bound to become still more dangerous, not least for the ethnic Chinese. The Chinese account for barely 3 per cent of Indonesia's population of 204 million. But they control about 70 per cent of all private commercial, financial and industrial activity.
This generates resentment. Riots have broken out in any number of cities in recent years and although each has been sparked by a particular incident most have ended up with rioters venting their fury on Chinese and/or Christian targets.
In some cases, the army appears to have stood back and allowed the riots to run on, a common enough practice in earlier years but one which has generally been frowned on during the New Order. The reasons for this are not clear. It may be that some officers fear they could be brought to book for human rights abuses if they open fire on rioters. It may be that some units have been outnumbered and in no position to use force. It may be that there has been some sympathy for the rioters.
In the midst of all this, Sofjan Wanandi was called in for questioning. According to the army, police investigators had "evidence" that Mr Wanandi was prepared to provide financial backing to a "communist-inspired" group which is being linked to a bomb explosion in a Jakarta apartment.
This was a curious claim. Sofjan Wanandi (Liem Bian Khoen) has impeccable New Order credentials. A Catholic who played a prominent role in the anti-communist and anti-Sukarno student movement in the mid-1960s, he became a key adviser to the late Major General Sudjono Humardhani, the elfin Javanese ystic-cum- financier who was one of Soeharto's closest aides.
Later, Sofjan built his Gemala Group into one of Indonesia's most powerful conglomerates. Gemala has 25 joint ventures with foreign companies, including Century Yuasa Batteries in Australia.
While Sofjan worked alongside Sudjono Humardhani, his older brother, Jusuf Wanandi (Liem Bian Kie), became the right-hand man of Lieutenant General Ali Moertopo, Soeharto's key political advisor during the first decade of the New Order. Jusuf Wanandi is one of the most visible leaders of CSIS, which was established by Moertopo and Humardhani when they were at the height of their power in 1971.
In Indonesia, where political manoeuvres are so often carried on behind a screen, no-one really believed that Wanandi was involved in a bomb plot.
Nor did the army pursue that line during the interrogation process. It concentrated instead on the vice-presidential issue and Wanandi's claim, perhaps articulated too vigorously, that if Habibie were to become vice-president, the Rupiah would plunge to a disastrous 20,000 to the US dollar.
It goes without saying that the targeting of prominent ethnic Chinese business leaders is extremely dangerous. It is also potentially counter-productive and self-defeating. Indonesia, having put the wind up foreign investors, is further eroding the confidence of domestic Chinese capital, an essential element in the nation's eventual economic rehabilitation.
Indonesia's Chinese are once again highly vulnerable, in fear of their lives and property. Singapore is said to be getting ready to repel boarders. Australian officials are looking at worst-case scenarios involving the arrival of boat people and overstaying "tourists".
Nor does it help that Habibie's ascendancy may have eased the pressure on men such as Wanandi. "They have let the genie out of the bottle," said an analyst whose concern about the "flow-on" effect has increased with each new report of mobs laying waste to Chinese shops and warehouses. "You only need to hint at these things and the effect can be extreme."
What disturbs many people is the evident high-level support for this approach.
President Soeharto, who in recent years has gone out of his way to court the Islamic community, has sailed close to the wind on this issue, talking about attacks on the rupiah and of the need to crack down on speculators. Ominously, he has used the phrase "we Muslims". Few people can remember a time when the President has spoken in these "us against them" terms and his remarks have been widely interpreted as a tilt at the ethnic Chinese.
Why is this happening? Many believe the authorities are seeking to scapegoat an unpopular minority to deflect blame for the nation's economic collapse.
Others suggest the president may is stepping up his campaign to put the squeeze on the wealthy Chinese conglomerates, which have proved unwilling to meet new unofficial imposts. Some think he may be ready to sever his links with most -- but by no means all -- of the Chinese tycoons.
According to an Indonesian editor, Soeharto may resent the fact that the Chinese no longer seem to know their place.
"They don't behave like a good concubine," the editor said. "They would like to be the first wife. They don't know they are concubines. "Farewell my Concubine!' That will be the heading."
Concubines or not, Indonesia's big Chinese entrepreneurs will no doubt survive the current troubles, perhaps, in the worst case, after a temporary absence abroad.
The worry is that millions of ordinary Chinese will have to ride out the increasingly dangerous rage of pribumi Indonesians, the long-suffering wong cilik (little people) who, like the sans- culottes of 1789, can't see that the nations problems were not created by the owner of the corner store.