G. K. Goh, Jakarta – Embattled Indonesian President Abdurrahman Wahid has stepped up his defiance saying he will not resign and challenged the military and police to try and use force to oust him, media reported on Monday.

Wahid, trying desperately to stave off likely impeachment in August, said he would not step down even if the armed forces turned their guns on the presidential palace, underscoring the prickly relations between the Muslim cleric and the military. "They can point their guns and shoot at the palace ... what I'm doing is maintaining the unity of the state and I will not hesitate to deal with violators of the constitution," the Jakarta Post daily quoted him as saying.

Wahid compared himself to Indonesia's founding President Sukarno – ousted in the mid-1960s following a coup attempt blamed on the now banned Indonesian Communist Party – who he said faced the same adversity. "At that time he [Sukarno] talked to the TNI [military] and said: 'Go ahead, you can shoot me because I have been chosen by the people'," Wahid said.

Wahid is growing increasingly isolated in his scramble to hold on to power and has driven a wedge between himself and the military in the process. Earlier this month he sacked the national police chief General Bimantoro. His rejection of the presidential order to step aside has won widespread support from senior police and major factions in parliament. He also sacked widely respected chief security minister and former general Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono. Rumours also surfaced last week, which were denied, that Wahid would sack armed forces commander Admiral Widodo as part of his attempts to cling to power.

Wahid's threat to declare a state of emergency if legislators persist in the impeachment effort has drawn fire from the armed forces. A state of emergency would allow the president to dissolve parliament and call snap elections.

Indonesia's supreme legislature, the People's Consultative Assembly (MPR), will consider impeaching Wahid on August 1 over two graft scandals and his chaotic 19-month rule. It has the power to dismiss Wahid, whom it elected president for a five-year term in October 1999. MPR speaker Amien Rais over the weekend said the assembly would press ahead with the impeachment hearing in August even if Wahid defied a requirement to attend.