Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono
Condemnation greeted the President’s “feeble” speech on mounting
tensions between Indonesia and Malaysia, while a major party in the
ruling coalition dropped plans for interpellation on the issue.
Shortly
after the speech — which was broadcast live from the Indonesian
Military’s (TNI) headquarters in Cilangkap, East Jakarta, late
Wednesday — President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono was called a “coward”
and “insensitive” to Indonesia’s increasing sense of nationalism.
The
furor was triggered after the arrest of three Indonesian officials by
Malaysian authorities on Aug. 13 in the waters near Riau Islands
province.
Postings on social networking sites such as Twitter
said Yudhoyono’s speech was “feeble” and “degraded the nation’s
self-esteem”.
Far from declaring war on Malaysia, as some had
hoped or expected, the President stressed that diplomacy would
“thoroughly” settle all border issues. Negotiations over the nation’s
sea border near Riau Islands is one of many ongoing border issues
between Indonesian and both Malaysia and Singapore.
Yudhoyono mentioned the countries’ close bilateral ties, adding the need to “speed up” negotiations.
In
an abrupt about-face, a major political partner in the President’s
coalition, the Golkar Party, said Thursday that it had dropped plans to
join an interpellation against the government.
“We scrutinized
the President’s words and his facial expressions [which] were very
serious and measured,” Golkar central board member Priyo Budi Santoso
said, as quoted by online news agencies.
Golkar was “relieved”
by the President’s speech because Yudhoyono stressed that there would
be “no compromise” on issues regarding national sovereignty despite
close bilateral ties, Priyo added.
Priyo said Golkar had decided
to wait for manifestations of the government’s plans, specifically the
President’s emphasis on settling all disputes thoroughly and swiftly.
Members of opposition parties such as the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P) said the speech fell flat.
The
choice of time and venue for the speech — the TNI’s headquarters after
a dinner breaking the Ramadan fast — might have led people to expect
that the President would order the military to “seriously safeguard”
national sovereignty, PDI-P legislator Tubagus Hasanuddin said
Thursday. “Instead he went on about how Indonesia depends on Malaysia,
which further crushed Indonesians’ egos,” said Tubagus, who is also on
House of Representatives’ Commission I on foreign affairs.
Commission
deputy head Hasanuddin said it was “pointless” for Yudhoyono to order
faster negotiations when border talks had already been tightly
scheduled. The next negotiations are scheduled for Sept. 6 in Kinabalu
near the Indonesian-Malaysian border on Borneo.
Apart from
failing to highlight the arrest of the Indonesian officials, Hasanuddin
said the President failed to respond firmly to Malaysian Prime Minister
Najib Razak’s criticism of anti-Malaysian rallies in Indonesia, one of
which involved protesters throwing feces at the Malaysian Embassy in
Jakarta.
However veteran Indonesian diplomat Wiryono
Sastrohandoyo said the President had to be cautious in his statements,
such as those regarding two million Indonesians working in Malaysia.
“People demand that we withdraw our migrant workers from Malaysia — but can we create jobs to accommodate them?” Wiryono said.
“When
they demand that we go to war, have they thought about the costs? ...
Are we ready to face another financial crisis if we decide to redeclare
Bung Karno’s ‘Wipe out Malaysia’ campaign?” he asked, referring to
former president Sukarno.
Indonesia has signed the ASEAN Charter
and will take over ASEAN’s rotating chair next year, making it unwise
to settle conflicts with a neighboring country through violence, he
said.
Lawmaker Mahfudz Shiddiq from the Prosperous Justice Party
said Indonesia needed to show “a stronger stance” on Malaysia if the
country failed to show a positive response to the President’s speech.
