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Wahid rejects MPs' summons to explain financial scandals

Source
Sydney Morning Herald - October 12, 2000

Lindsay Murdoch, Jakarta – President Abdurrahman Wahid has rejected a summons to be questioned by MPs over two palace financial scandals, creating a new threat to his government.

Challenging the authority of a 50-member panel of MPs, Mr Wahid said he would refuse to answer questions about the scandals and would only clarify the issues in a written statement. He said that under the Constitution only a full sitting of parliament's 500 members could force him to answer questions on allegations of treason, nothing else.

But the House Speaker, Mr Akbar Tanjung, said yesterday that a parliamentary summons was protected by the law. "Therefore, anybody who is summoned by the DPR [parliament], including Gus Dur, must come," Mr Tanjung said, using Mr Wahid's nickname.

The panel had said it planned to call 30 witnesses, including Mr Wahid, in sessions starting next Tuesday over the alleged theft by his personal masseur of $US4.2million from the state food agency Bulog and a $US2million personal loan from the Sultan of Brunei. MPs say there has been no accounting for the sultan's money, which was earmarked for humanitarian aid in the violence-hit province of Aceh. The masseur has not been seen since the Bulog money was discovered missing early this year.

Mr Wahid's stand-off with parliament will further heighten political uncertainty in the country of 210 million people as his presidency faces mounting criticism at home and abroad.

Mr Wahid's international standing is at its lowest ebb since he took office 11 months ago, particularly in the wake of his failure to rein in pro-Jakarta Timorese militias waging a campaign of terror in West Timor.

MPs from Mr Wahid's National Awakening Party have argued strongly against the investigating panel summoning him. But the panel chairman, Mr Bachtiar Chamsyah, said if there was sufficient evidence Mr Wahid would be called to testify.

He quoted a 1999 law that stipulated that all citizens should answer a parliamentary summons or face 12 months' jail. Mr Wahid has had a stormy relationship with parliament since taking office.

Parliament faction leaders questioned Mr Wahid for six hours on Tuesday over a range of issues, including his dismissal of the national police chief last month without consulting MPs, continuing violence in troubled provinces, and a 12per cent rise in fuel prices.

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