Devi Asmarani, Jakarta – Mrs Megawati Sukarnoputri's critics said yesterday it is time the Indonesian President took responsibility for her administration's poor performance in key areas instead of blaming others for it. They were responding to off-the-cuff remarks made by the President recently in which she attributed her administration's ineffectiveness to the media and human rights groups.

Analysts said her outburst just showed the growing pressure on her leadership and the increasing unpopularity of her Indonesian Democratic Party-Struggle (PDI-P) ahead of next year's election.

For other critics, her remarks made during the 18th World Habitat Day in Bali last week gave them even more ammunition to lambast her, saying she lacked leadership and a willingness to listen.

Recent surveys have shown the public increasingly disenchanted with the way Mrs Megawati has dealt with corruption and law enforcement in Indonesia.

But she said she would have made more progress had it not been for the media and human rights group. For instance, she could not execute convicted corrupt officials as done in China as there would be an uproar.

"If I meet a corrupt official and immediately ... I shoot him, I am very sure that these people," pointing to members of the press, "will tomorrow write stories about how the Indonesian President has violated human rights." She also criticised a recent nationwide string of evictions in which hundreds of illegal settlers were driven off state and private land and left with nowhere to go just before the end of fasting month celebrations and at the start of the annual floods. Human rights groups condemned the timing.

But it was not her fault, Mrs Megawati said. It was the fault of corrupt regional administrators who had been bribed to look the other way, and when the build-up of squatters had reached an unacceptable level.

Anti-corruption activists condemned her comments, saying they were irrelevant to the problems they raised. Said prominent lawyer Todung Mulya Lubis: "Efforts to combat corruption and possible human rights violations are two different things."

The 1999 anti-corruption law provides a maximum sentence of death for convicted corrupt officials. The President has no problems with the death sentence, as apparent in her rejection of clemency requests from death-row drug convicts.

Analysts say that maybe the situation could improve if she spent more time listening to the Indonesian people and less time complaining.

From the previous regime which left her with too much homework, the lazy and corrupt bureaucrats, the overly powerful Parliament, the undisciplined and biased media to the greedy provincial leaders – all have been the object of her blame in the past two years.

Political observer Sudjati Djiwandono said: "She is the nation's leader, meaning she is the most responsible in the country. If she is not happy to lead Indonesia, then she should step down."