Issues of The Day: ‘SBY: I will leave office in 2014’

Aug. 18, Online

President Susilo Bambang Yu-dhoyono asserted on Wednesday he had no intention of extending his tenure and would leave office in 2014. Speaking at the People’s Consultative Assembly (MPR), Yudhoyono said holding on power for too long was prone to corruption.

“I underline that I will end my term of office in 2014,” he said as quoted by kompas.com. He was responding to the controversy sparked by a Democratic Party politician Ruhut Sitompul, who, earlier in the day, proposed a constitutional amendment that would allow Yudhoyono to cling on power for another five years.

Yudhoyono said such an amendment would violate the country’s political moral and ethics. “We uphold democracy and the presidential system of government because everything is not in the hands of the president. Is it proper to change the hard-won constitutional amendment on the limitations on a presidential term?” he said.

He deemed the discourse on the constitutional amendment a result of creative way of thinking of the nation and not his own initiative. “We amended the Constitution when I chaired the Indonesian Military faction at the MPR. I genuinely pushed for a limitation of the presidential term of office to only two five-year periods,” he said.

Your comments:

When the President steps down in 2014, as he should, how will history judge his achievements? On present form, he will go down in history as a man who arrived on a wave of hope but who delivered very little in the end.

David
Jakarta

Who is a better candidate than SBY? Any suggestions?

Phoenix
The US

SBY, please leave office now, let someone else more capable fix the FPI and police problems.

Nohkes
Depok, West Java

The real problem seems to be a lack of suitable candidates for president.
Indonesia needs a real break from the past and yet just seems to get
a rehashed version of the same
old thing.

Bilbo

Jakarta

When President SBY leaves office, I am not sure that the next president will be able to fix the many serious problems such as corruption, violations of human rights, etc. because all of the candidates were part of the New Order regime in the past that contributed to the creation of corruption in the country.

So please, never elect any candidate who was involved in the old regime if we want to fix the problems mentioned above.

Asyikin
Bogor

Despite many problems that our country is facing, I’m sure that SBY is struggling for the benefit of RI.

The complexity of the problems in our developing country cannot
be solved all at once by any one
president.

So, let’s appreciate what our President has done, and maybe we
can mention what contribution we have made.

Eva
Malang