Richard S Ehrlich, Jakarta – Former Indonesian president Suharto, safe from prosecution for allegedly embezzling millions of dollars during his 32-year-long, US-backed regime, has decided to give something away for free.
Shrouded in secrecy and officially suffering "dementia", the ex-dictator agreed to provide a sample of his footprints, to be enshrined alongside the undersole impressions of other Indonesian presidents and officials in a government-installed downtown Jakarta display. Local media compared the political walkway to the showcasing of famous actors' handprints set in cement on Hollywood Boulevard in California.
Above the ankles, Suharto has remained mostly unseen by the outside world and was expected to continue hiding at his comfortable home, until he dies.
Below his ankles, however, Suharto possessed something the Indonesian government craved so much that several officials pilgrimaged to his Jakarta house on a hot, smoggy Thursday morning last week, hoping the disgraced leader would comply.
Suharto, 82, is widely hated for allowing his adult children and other relatives and friends to grow spectacularly wealthy while he manipulated US aid, the domestic economy, a Byzantine system of "contributions" and other lucrative income.
Unwilling to put him on trial after he was diagnosed as mentally unstable, the government is now happy to play footsie with Suharto instead.
"He is old, but he looks very fresh," Jakarta Governor Sutiyoso told reporters upon emerging from Suharto's home on leafy Cendana Street, accompanied by two workers who took an imprint of Suharto's feet.
In his meeting with the governor, Suharto, a widower, was accompanied by his eldest daughter Siti "Tutut" Hardiyanti Rukmana, now in her mid-50s, along with former minister of justice Ismail Saleh and former state secretary Saadilah Mursjid.
Five years ago, when Suharto was ousted from power, his daughter Tutut was minister of social affairs and said to be worth an estimated US$2 billion through her investments in more than 100 companies including Bank Central Asia, telecommunications, domestic airlines, a pulp and paper mill, plus the toll booths which punctuate highways in and around Jakarta.
On May 21, 1998, she appeared stern-faced, standing next to her father while he reluctantly announced his resignation in a televised speech. Suharto was toppled during student-led street riots that left 500-1,000 people dead.
Sutiyoso was reluctant to discuss Suharto's mental condition and said his visit on Thursday was simply to get the former president's footprints.
The prints will soon be permanently installed in pavement at the edge of Jakarta's revered Freedom Square – which is adorned by the National Monument – across from the white, cake-like Presidential Palace from where Suharto once reigned.
Other Indonesian presidents, including current leader Megawati Sukarnoputri, the virtually blind Abdurrahman "Gus Dur" Wahid, Bacharuddin J Habibie and Megawati's late father Sukarno, will also have their footprints in the pavement.
Megawati's prints were taken on June 5 along with those of Sutiyoso, because the walkway will include the capital's current and former governors on the opposite side of Freedom Square, across from City Hall. Other notable personalities will also have impressions of their feet on display.
Indonesians currently enjoy much greater freedom compared with the repressive rule of Suharto, but widespread poverty and a resurgence by the military into political life has made many people cynical of the "reforms" which were supposed to evolve after Suharto's downfall.
This Southeast Asian nation "seems to be adrift with uncertainty, and the national leadership is beset by internal squabbling among a political elite that blatantly displays its greed", lamented the Jakarta Post in its editorial last Friday. In 2000, judges halted a trial into Suharto's alleged embezzlement of $570 million after agreeing with doctors who said he was suffering "dementia" and would be mentally unable to provide truthful testimony or coherent memories.
Before the nationally televised trial was stopped, doctors showed computer imagery of Suharto's diseased brain to reveal damage by strokes and heart disease and his answers to a "dementia questionnaire". They also presented childish drawings Suharto made for the doctors when asked to draw everyday items, such as a flower, a house and a clock.
Wahid has estimated Suharto's family fortune at a whopping $45 billion. Other investigators said the family was worth only $15 billion, but suspected most of it was embezzled or snatched through corrupt, monopolistic contracts during Suharto's reign.
Over the years, doctors have fitted Suharto with a pacemaker during heart surgery and treated him for strokes, low blood pressure, breathing and urinary problems.
In July 2002, his younger son Hutomo "Tommy" Mandala Putra was jailed for 15 years for masterminding the assassination of a judge. The judge was killed after sentencing Tommy for corruption, possession of weapons and evading justice.