Anita Rachman – Is the Democratic Party attempting to direct the public spotlight away from Muhammad Nazaruddin? Political analysts say that since the former party treasurer left the country, the Democrats have been in damage-control mode and the recent "revelations" about a certain Mr. A could be part of these efforts.

A text message that began circulating not long after Nazaruddin flew to Singapore – a day before the Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK) requested, and received, a travel ban against him – lashed out at leading Democrats. Among other things, it suggested that the party's advisory board chairman, President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, was guilty of inappropriate behavior.

Yudhoyono went out of his way to very publicly and very firmly deny the claims. And in the past few days, Democrats have hinted that a politician they would "only identify as Mr. A" was possibly behind the text message, as well as other efforts to rip the party apart.

Ever since, news portals and television stations have been trying to figure out the identity of Mr. A.

Political analyst Yunarto Wijaya, from Charta Politika, said if the Democrats failed to reveal the identify of Mr. A, it would leave the party open to criticism that it was attempting to draw attention from its own problems by calling into question the behavior of its political opponents.

"If the Democrats fail to tell the public what their accusations are really about, then it is clear that they only want to divert attention from the graft scandal faced by one of their leaders, Nazaruddin," he said on Friday.

Already implicated in a graft scandal involving the construction of an athletes' village for November's Southeast Asian Games, Nazaruddin was recently accused by the head of the Constitutional Court, Mahfud M.D., of making an "unsolicited payment" of 120,000 Singapore dollars ($97,000) to the court's secretary general, Janedjri M. Gaffar.

Ramadhan Pohan, deputy secretary general of the Democratic Party, has said that Mr. A is not a Democrat but that the party knows him. "Mr. A is a politician," he said. "We never suspected that he harbored such a desire to destroy the party."

Widespread rumors that Mr. A is in fact Golkar Party chairman Aburizal Bakrie have been vehemently denied by Golkar officials. Golkar lawmaker Bambang Soesatyo said the Democrats needed to give their findings to the authorities if they were certain there was a Mr. A.

"The Democrats are attempting to divert attention away from the real issue, by spreading slanderous statements against those politicians whose first name happens to begin with the letter A," Bambang said. "What the Democratic Party is facing is an internal problem. They should keep it that way."

J. Kristiadi, a political analyst from the Center for Strategic and International Studies, told the Jakarta Globe that people should not buy the story about Mr. A.

"The Democratic Party is destroying itself," he said. "The party is trying to divert attention away from the real issue and find something else [to distract the public]."

Kristiadi said the Democrats should focus on what they campaigned on: fighting graft. "They should drag Nazaruddin out of Singapore and focus on their administration for the sake of the people," he said.

Ahmad Mubarok, a member of the Democrats' advisory board, denied the party was trying to divert attention. He echoed Ramadhan in saying Mr. A was an outsider who was attempting to destroy the Democratic Party.

"But let me tell you something, that will never work," Mubarok said. "The president warned us that [party] leaders need to be careful, because forces outside the party are trying to target it."

He also said that Nazaruddin's main reason for traveling to Singapore was not to seek medical advice and treatment, as he had claimed. "That was a secondary reason. The primary one was to avoid being chased by reporters," he said.

[Additional reporting by Amir Tejo and Markus Junianto Sihaloho.]