Robert Go, Jakarta – President Abdurrahman Wahid was greeted with cheers yesterday when he disclosed the order to arrest a member of the Suharto clan in connection with Wednesday's bomb blast at the Jakarta Stock Exchange building. The response underscores the distrust and hatred many Indonesians harbour towards the former First Family.
Mr Abdurrahman told an afternoon prayer gathering confidently that Mr Hutomo "Tommy" Mandalaputra, Suharto's youngest son, would be arrested despite what he himself termed as lack of incriminating evidence.
Indeed, the line-up of suspects in the aftermath of recent Jakarta bombings have invariably included those close to Suharto, who was driven from power in 1998 after 32 years of autocratic rule.
Circumstantial evidence does point in the direction of the business cronies or the military officers who allegedly benefited during the past three decades from their connections to Suharto, and therefore would want to sabotage the government's case.
Bomb blasts have accompanied each major stage of the government's corruption probe against the former ruler, disturbing public peace and shaking confidence in the country's economic and political stability.
Police spokesmen have reported that the explosive used in the stock exchange complex was similar to that which blew up Philippines Ambassador Leonides Caday's car on August 1.
Investigations into the explosion at the Attorney-General's office on July 4, which occurred a mere few hours after government prosecutors interrogated Mr Hutomo over his alleged involvement in a business scam, also revealed that the terrorists used components produced by the military's material factory and warehouse.
More damaging to Mr Hutomo personally was the sniper attack that sent workers at parliament scurrying for cover when he made his April appearance in the complex to answer probing questions from MPs. But all of this was simply inferential evidence, which in other countries that claimed to be democratic, would not lead to actual arrest.
Perhaps a poll taken last year can explain why people were so quick to think that Mr Hutomo, and the rest of the Suharto family, would be capable of dastardly actions that harm or kill innocent bystanders or the poor.
Asked which of Mr Suharto's six children was most deserving of being dragged to court and jailed, 58 per cent of Indonesians listed Mr Hutomo's name. Like his brothers and sisters, he also amassed wealth during his father's turn at the helm, operating lucrative business monopolies and receiving favourable terms for numerous projects.
The opinion survey, which was commissioned by a group of 15 major publications, also indicated that most Indonesians judged him to be the most arrogant and flamboyant member of the family.
Despite the shared perception that all of the family and their cronies used unfair and illegal business practices, the people apparently also felt that Mr Hutomo ran his companies less "normally", and was generally more corrupt than the others. That the 38-year-old often flaunted his "untouchable" status as the former president's favoured son openly also irked the masses.
But a businessman with ties to the Suharto family and the criminal underworld told The Straits Times yesterday: "Public opinion has been against Tommy for a long while, but the fact shows that he is simply a survivor even when people focus on him. "The government should not draw conclusions like this. They should see that it is too risky for Tommy to go around planting bombs."