Agence France Presse in Jakarta – Armed forces commander Admiral Widodo Adi Sudjipto reassured the nation yesterday that the military had no desire to return to politics, and would dismiss anyone who did.

"TNI [the armed forces] is currently showing a significantly different face, in the context of its having left the political scene," Admiral Widodo said after meeting of top brass in Jakarta. "It is the strong commitment of the entire rank and file of the TNI to no longer engage in practical politics or what was known as the TNI's socio-political function."

He said the neutrality of the armed forces during last year's elections – the country's first free and fair polls in more than four decades – should be read as a commitment to keep out of politics. "Besides that, TNI will no longer enter political polemics," he said.

The admiral stressed that members of the armed forces had to choose whether to take part in politics, and shed their links with the military, or to remain in the forces but out of politics.

"Whoever in the TNI decides to take an active part in politics, for example if an individual joins a [political] campaign as a speaker, he should first resign from his unit, and from the military," Admiral Widodo said.

"So a choice has to be taken," he said, adding that those who opted for politics in the post-Suharto era would have to seek early retirement. During the 32-year rule of former president Suharto, himself a retired general, the Indonesian armed forces, especially the army, played a pervasive and often decisive role in politics.

Under a law issued during Suharto's rule, the military was guaranteed a political role alongside its traditional role of defending the nation. The law meant military men took key postings in the government, judiciary and legislature as well as in social organisations and in business. The reform drive that dragged down Suharto in 1998 included demands for the military to quit politics and return to the barracks.

Earlier yesterday, the Antara news agency quoted army chief General Tyanso Sudarto as saying: "There is absolutely no intention to re-involve the TNI into the political scene." General Sudarto said that next March the TNI would reorganise itself to adjust to the demands of the times, but it would be up to the Government and the legislature to approve the changes. The two-day military leadership meeting was held to examine its new role in the post-Suharto reform era, press reports said.