The Dictator's Fall

by Andreas Harsono, Jeff Elliott
also Monitor Wire Services

And although the wily Suharto has announced that he will relinquish leadership to his vice president, the future remains murky. In a nation where political alliances can flip-flop in an hour, both military repression and open civil war are still possible.

As reported earlier in the Monitor, the killing of the peaceful students from an elite university stunned the nation. In the rage that followed, the capital city of Jakarta was shut down with widespread rioting. More than 500 people died, most of them trapped in burning buildings when protestors turned wild and looted shops and supermarkets following the burials. Rushing home from a Middle East summit, President Suharto immediately ordered the military to move in force into the streets.

Surprising both opponents and supporters, Suharto said Tuesday that he would resign after leading the nation through a series of reforms: Shuffling the cabinet and setting up a reform committee before a new election sometime in the near future. In a press conference, Suharto still insisted that he would not step down immediately.

"Resignation is not an issue. I'm more than prepared to resign but does my resignation mean that the problem will be solved? Constitutionally it should be the vice president who will take over," said Suharto, who then answered his own question and said that Vice President B.J. Habibie is likely to have a similar problem. "People will question his position and it might lead to more turmoil," he said.

But Indonesian students and opposition politicians, who had been staging rallies since March, scorned the proposal, saying that the 77 year-old Suharto has to resign at once. Scholars and religious leaders told the dictator this in a meeting just prior to his announcement. Muslim scholar Nurcholish Madjid said that he had opened the talk by telling Suharto that he had to resign immediately. "My calculation on the crisis in based on seconds, instead of minutes, which means that the longer he stays the more serious the damage is," Nurcholish said.

More than 50,000 students who were now gathered at the House of Representatives booed Suharto's nationally-broadcast announcement. They managed to gain control of the sound system in the compound and allowed speaker after speaker to denounce Suharto.

The students raised a huge banner reading, "Suharto and Habibie: step down now!" Clad in the colorful jackets of their respective campuses, they vowed that they would continue to occupy the parliament building until the current, largely appointive parliament holds a convention to ask for an accounting from Suharto for his rule.

The students held free speech forums inside and outside the building, denouncing both Suharto and Habibie. Dozens of them also scaled the dome of the building and raised their banners. "Suharto go to hell with your plan. Step down now," one read.

But the focus was always this: The massive rally would still be held on Wednesday, and one million were expected.

Army commander Gen. Wiranto Monday stood behind Suharto, echoing the dictator's preference for a cabinet reshuffle and moderate reform over presidential succession.

All of Indonesia's six television and more than 600 radio stations broadcast Wiranto's announcement, repeating it every five minutes and giving a strong impression that the military was quite disturbed by any other proposal.

As if trying to face the student challenges, Suharto's three most loyal generals gathered their soldiers Tuesday in a stadium about one kilometer from the parliament building.

One general even offered a show of force, driving more than a dozen tanks into a circle around the occupied parliament building. The two-star general also peppered his men with nationalistic speeches, asking them to follow orders in a bid to "save our people and our country."

Many journalists, politicians and diplomats believe that the armed forces is now heavily split between the more moderate camp, headed by Wiranto, and the hardliner Lt. Gen. Prabowo Subianto (Suharto's son-in-law) who is the commander of the elite 27,000 special forces known as Kopassus.

Wiranto is said to be trying to slow down the parliamentary and the student agendas in a bid to engage the Prabowo camp. A fast reform measure, Wiranto reportedly believes, might put the two camps on a collision course and create a civil war in Indonesia.

By Wednesday, more than 60,000 had joined the sit-in at the Indonesian parliament building despite heavy rains, ferried there by hundreds of buses and trucks. The parliament compound turned into a huge bazaar with food vendors opening their tents.

According to the Indonesian newspaper Kompas, the scene inside the building was chaotic but exhilerating. "Thousands of students now fill almost all rooms and corridors of the Parliament building. They sleep sprawled on chairs, on the floor covered with newspapers or used cartons. The atmosphere inside the building is extremely noisy, while the floors are covered with debris..."

Hundreds of white-collar workers like stock brokers, fund managers and young executives also joined the protest in their suits and ties. A spokesman for the financial executives, Bara Hasibuan, said in his speech that the concerns of the students were also his concerns, adding that Suharto has to step down first to give way to reform.

House speaker Harmoko, who holds the third most powerful position in the country, held a long meeting with students. The students said there was only one choice: the president must resign by Friday. Harmoko has not appeared in public since that meeting.

In a separate press conference, the head of Suharto's political party Golkar outlined five options that might solve the crisis. Four of the five choices required both Suharto and Vice President Habibie to resign immediately. Many in Jakarta were stunned that such a proposal came from his own party.

Foreign embassies in Jakarta issued alerts, telling their citizens not to go to Jakarta's main protest area Wednesday, apparently fearing that the protest might turn violent as it did last week. Japan and Taiwan had military C-130 transport aircraft ready to evacuate its citizens. Nearby Malaysia deployed patrol ships to repel a possible mass exodus of Indonesians, according to the daily Nanyang Siang Pau newspaper.

In the ancient Javanese city of Yogyakarta, about 550 kilometers east of Jakarta, 500,000 people rallied in the city square to demand that Suharto step down. Similar rallies also took place in other cities.

Outside the parliament building compound, Jakarta's streets were eerily quiet as tanks, soldiers armed with machine guns and combat gear, and miles of barbed wires blocked major roads in the heart of Jakarta. Jakarta was prepared to be a battle zone.

The students and Muslim leader Amien Rais had earlier planned to march from the parliament to the palace, but Amien cancelled the rally for fear of military violence. Appearing shaken in a televised announcent, Rais asked the people to pray instead.

Rais later said a general had told him the army did not care if Indonesia had its own Tiananmen Square -- a reference to the 1989 massacre of hundreds of Chinese students which defused China's democracy movement. "Somebody told me, who happens to be an army general, that he doesn't care at all if ... an accident like Tiananmen will take place today," Rais said. "I was shocked by the army's determination."

That vice president Habibie will lead the nation also leaves many uneasy. It is a public secret here that engineer-turned-politician Habibie is not an able politican. He is also known to be a big spender. His pet projects, such as the aircraft manufacturer and the ship building industry, suffered huge losses and contributed to Indonesia's enormous debt problem.

Habibie's success will pivot on his ability to make an alliance with the powerful army. But on Tuesday, when Suharto turned down the suggestion that he resign, answered by questioning if the Indonesian people would follow Habibie. "I hand off," Suharto reportedly said. "[Whether or not Habibie resigns] is his own judgment."