Jakarta – A prominent critic of former leader Suharto Monday urged the government of President B.J. Habibie to call on friendly foreign states to freeze all Suharto-linked assets in their countries. "I would propose that the Indonesian government, the Habibie government, strongly urges friendly governments to freeze the assets, confiscate them, sell them and return the money to the Indonesian people," George Aditjondro told journalists here. "The Indonesian people need this (money) badly," he added. Aditjondro on Sunday returned to a hero's welcome for a week-long visit after spending the past three years in Australia, where he had fled after being put on the police wanted list for slandering Suharto. A teacher of the sociology of corruption at Australia's Newcastle University, Aditjondro is well known in Jakarta for his research – disseminated on the Internet – into the wealth of both Suharto and Habibie.
"If the Habibie government is sincere in its intention to overcome the crisis of essentials for the poor, and at the same time probe the wealth of Suharto ...then it should urge the governments of the countries concerned to confiscate and sell all assets of the Suharto family there," Aditjondro said. "I do not have a personal grudge against Suharto ...I just do not have the heart, to see that they (Suharto and his family) can be so rich with so much riches abroad while people here, such as in Jakarta, have to separate (rice grains) from sand and small stones to be able to eat," he said.
Aditjondro said there five houses worth up to two million pounds owned by three of Suharto's six children and one half-brother in London, five houses in the United States, several in Bermuda and the Cayman Islands and a sprawling ranch in New Zealand owned by Suharto's youngest son.
He also cited a forest concession in Surinam controlled by Suharto's half brother, a luxury cruiser of his youngest son berthed in Darwin and several gas shipping companies of his sons in Singapore. Suharto's eldest daughter, he said, owned the operational rights on some 300 kilometres (186 miles) of toll roads in Malaysia, the Philippines, Myanmar and China. "This list is only a small part of the wealth of the Suharto family ...that are partly or entirely in the possession of the family of the world's third richest head of state," Aditjondro said. Justifying his proposal, he cited as precedent international action over the overseas wealth of Philippine former leader Ferdinand Marcos and Zairean former president Mobutu Sese Seko. "These are precedents and that can be followed," Adicondro said.
Students protest against communist taint Agence France Presse - September 28 Jakarta – A small group of Indonesian university students protested outside a daily newspaper here Monday against suggestions that student activists were tainted by communism, student sources said. A dozen students from the pro-reform Forum Kota (Forkot) group, which agitated for the ouster of ex-president Suharto, protested outside the Republika daily, whose general manager is close to President B.J. Habibie, Suharto's successor.
In a leaflet they said they objected to a banner headline in Republika last week which suggested they were tainted by communists and urged Indonesian newspapers not to "slant stories." The headline read "ABRI (Indonesian military) alerts of a 30 September Forkot movement."
September 30, 1965 was the date of a failed coup blamed on the then-legal Indonesian Communist Party (PKI), which was followed by the slaughter of more than half a million people by official count, the jailing of millions more and the outlawing of the PKI. The article used a quote by armed forces commander General Wiranto to suggest that there was a "communist-like pattern" to some of the Forkot activities. Witnesses at the Republika office however said the protesters from Forkot, which embraces students from some 40 universities in the greater Jakarta area, carried no posters or banners nor did they make any demands of the daily.
"Forum Kota is an independent university student alliance," the leaflet said. "Rumours/opinions stating that Forum Kota is an anti-Islam and a communist group is not true," it said, adding that a number of Moslem universities were included in the group.
The release went on to stress that the group had no plans nor would it hold any mass demonstrations on September 30, the eve of Indonesia's commemoration on the state ideology of Pancasila. "We condemn any cruel allegations or accusations aimed at the Forum Kota," it said, adding that the students believed the accusations had been made to serve "the interests of a certain group." With the outlawing of the PKI, the Suharto government and the military regularly used the accusation of communist leanings or the possession of books referring to communism to jail dissidents.