Patrick Guntensperger, Jakarta – Under former dictator Suharto, the military linked Golkar party dominated Indonesian politics for decades. Now, in a more democratic era, the deceased Suharto's controversial son, Hutomo Mandala Putri, popularly known as Tommy, has to the surprise of many announced his intention to take over the party's reins.

While still influential but no longer all-powerful, Golkar is in disarray after the poor showing in July of its presidential candidate, incumbent Vice President Jusuf Kalla, who finished last among three competing candidates. Even in the legislative polls, Golkar candidates made a poor showing compared to its 2004 win, giving ground to upstart parties and not taking sufficient seats to form a credible opposition against recently re-elected President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono and his upstart Democrat Party.

Golkar's upcoming convention, where a new party chairman will be selected, is thus critical to the party's future, analysts say. Before last month's presidential election, when the polls showed that Kalla was headed for a landslide loss, there were already intra-party calls for a leadership change. Observers believe that unless the party embraces young charismatic candidates instead of shuffling the old New Order faces, the party risks being reduced to little more than a historical footnote after another national election cycle.

Until last week, most analysts believed Coordinating Minister for Welfare and billionaire businessman Aburizal Bakrie was the front runner to become chairman. Bakrie has major support inside the party, including that of influential former party chairman Akbar Tandjung, himself a former close associate of Suharto. It is also well known that Indonesian president Yudhoyono is in some ways still beholden to Bakrie for his previous financial support, for which he was apparently rewarded with two powerful cabinet positions. As Golkar clearly wishes to remain close to the new Yudhoyono administration, Bakrie's connections are perceived as a political asset.

Thus Tommy's announcement that he feels a "duty" to assume the leadership of the party his deceased father dominated has reset the political calculus. Some analysts believe that Tommy's move is at least partly inspired by his desire to thwart Bakrie's ambitions. It has also been interpreted as an indirect way of striking out at Akbar Tandjung and other Bakrie backers, a group that Tommy, 47, has long believed were responsible for his father's street protest-led ouster in 1998.

After Suharto fell and Indonesia began the process of incremental democratization, Golkar functionaries carried on largely as though nothing had changed. Although there are now over 130 political parties and elections are as free as any in Southeast Asia, one-time Golkar members still dominate the political landscape. Virtually every major player in the last two elections has strong ties to Golkar and the enormous and still-powerful civil service still largely sees itself as carrying on in the Suharto tradition.

That gives Tommy's unexpected bid for the party leadership some legitimacy, though legally there are impediments. Party regulations require chairman candidates to have held a party leadership position within the last 10 years, a qualification Tommy, due in part to a period of incarceration, notably lacks.

His advocates note another party regulation that states there are no restrictions on a party member's right to nominate himself for the chairmanship. Tommy has apparently taken that to mean that, as a card-carrying Golkar member, he has a right to run. And, out of deference, it's not clear yet that anyone in the party will seriously object to his nomination.

But the greater impediment to Tommy launching a career in national politics will be his criminal conviction for murder in 2002. After being convicted of graft in 2000, Suharto's youngest and favorite son arranged the contract assassination of the Supreme Court judge who handed down the ruling. He was also implicated, but never charged, in a bomb attack against the Jakarta Stock Exchange.

Tommy was tried and convicted for the judge's murder, but as a Suharto relative he was given a lenient sentence of 15 years, which Yudhoyono later commuted "out of respect for his family's good name". The initial corruption charges were later overturned and in total Tommy served four years for the contract-style, drive-by killing. That those months were spent playing golf while surrounded by friends and a team of bodyguards is an open secret reported widely in the press.

Since his release, Tommy has been occupied with running his global business empire through his 60% controlling stake in the Humpuss Group, which has more than 60 subsidiaries in industries ranging from construction to five-star hotels to pharmaceuticals. Some business analysts believe the group's total holdings could be worth as much as US$35 billion.

Those businesses were in the main founded and expanded from monopoly concessions granted to Tommy by his late father, including various spice monopolies and timber rights in outlying provinces. Many analysts have speculated those businesses have also been propped in part by the billions of dollars allegedly embezzled from the national coffers by Suharto. (Suharto has never been convicted for the alleged embezzlement.)

Tommy claims now to be imbued with a duty to country and often describes himself as a risk-taker who sets and achieves high goals. There is little question among analysts that his ultimate goal is the presidential palace occupied for 32 years by his father. And Suharto's shadow is still so long over the political scene that Tommy's candidacy is being taken seriously.

Part of his father's legacy is the still strong fealty of his supporters, which has apparently in some measure been passed on to the next generation. There is little question that a politically ambitious Tommy will be a force to be reckoned with at the upcoming convention, and there is a strong possibility that he will win, analysts say.

But while Tommy may hold some sway inside the party, it's not clear to most whether a convicted murderer would have the same pull with voters at democratic ballot boxes.

[Patrick Guntensperger is a Jakarta-based journalist and teacher of journalism. His blog can be found at http://pagun-view.blogspot.com.]