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Riau ready to host Golkar star wars
The Riau provincial executive board of the Golkar Party says that everything is in place to host the party's eighth national congress scheduled to be held from Oct
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he Riau provincial executive board of the Golkar Party says that everything is in place to host the party's eighth national congress scheduled to be held from Oct. 4 to 7.
The congress will determine the party's new chairman to replace Vice President Jusuf Kalla.
"We are ready to host the congress in all aspects. The news in the media saying that Riau lacks accommodation is not true," Golkar Riau provincial chairman, Rusli Zainal, was quoted as saying by Antara during a press conference in the provincial capital Pekanbaru, on Saturday.
"The rumors claiming there were a couple of chairman candidates who wished to hold the congress in other places, such as Makassar and South Sulawesi are also not true. I can assure you there is no internal conflict in the Golkar Party."
Chairman of the Riau branch of the Association of Indonesian Hotels and Restaurants, Indra B. Syukur, said there was more than enough hotel rooms available for congress participants.
"Some 4,000 hotel rooms are available in Pekanbaru. So, there are more than enough hotels to accommodate the participants who roughly need 900 rooms," he said.
Meanwhile, one of the chairman candidates, Yuddy Chrisnandi, said that Golkar needed new ideas for the future.
"Golkar will face heavy challenges in the future. First, it is clearly evident that public support toward the country has dropped significantly. We can see that in the results of the legislative and presidential elections," he said in Tasikmalaya, West Java, on Saturday.
Golkar came second in the legislative elections in April after the Democratic Party, which was founded by re-elected President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono. In the presidential race on July 8, Kalla finished third behind Megawati Soekarnoputri of the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P) and the Democratic Party's Yudhoyono.
"We need new ideas and spirits so the party will have the ability to restore its glory," said Yuddy.
Despite Yuddy's idealism, internal Golkar sources still say the strongest candidates to replace Kalla are the Coordinating Minister for the People's Welfare Aburizal Bakrie and media magnate Surya Paloh, who is also the current Golkar chief patron.
Analysts say that younger candidates such as Yuddy, do not stand a chance against the financial powers of Aburizal and Surya.
Political experts have also said that financial power is what really matters to Golkar members, who are mostly pragmatic and financially driven.
Both Surya and Aburizal claim that each have received full support from all Golkar regional branches for their candidacies.
However, the sudden entrance of Hutomo "Tommy" Mandala Soeharto, the youngest son of former president Soeharto, into the game has radically changed Golkar's political landscape.
The Soeharto family, regarded as one of the richest in the world, is more than an equal challenger of the financial power of both Aburizal and Paloh, according to political experts.
Transparency International has estimated that Soeharto's assets are worth between US$15 to 35 billion, but he and his family have denied that their family's fortune was amassed through corruption.
Yuddy has also met with Siti Hardiyanto Rukmana, who is Tommy's oldest sister, more popularly known as Tutut, and has told her that he would step down from the contest for the chairman post, should she decide to nominate herself. (hdt)
