SBY-Boediono violated Constitution: Interfaith forum

An interfaith dialogue forum in South Sulawesi has declared that President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono and Vice President Boediono violated their oaths and the 1945 Constitution by creating mass anxiety and diverting the public's attention from major national problems.

The dialogue, held on Monday, was attended by representatives of several religions –  including Islam, Buddhism, Hinduism, Catholicism and Protestantism – as well as academics and scholars from several universities in Makassar.

"We have all felt the anxiety. [There are] lies, political imagery, and diversion of political issues. If left unchecked, this country will be ruined. Do we want the Sept. 30, 1965 coup and the fall of Soeharto to happen again?"Qasim Mathar, a professor at Islamic University Alauddin Makassar and the initiator of the dialogue said Monday.

Isaac Ngeljaratan, from Hasanuddin University in Makassar, said Yudhoyono and Boediono had failed to protect Indonesians in the country as well as those abroad.

“People are killing each other, but the government does nothing about that. National assets continue to be sold to other countries. All of this evidence shows that Yudhoyono and Boediono have violated the Constitution,” he said.

A number of major issues in the country have gone unresolved, the forum heard, including the bailout of Bank Century, the verdict of graft defendant Gayus H. Tambunan. However, it said, the National Police, the Attorney General's Office and the tax office remained corrupt, as was evidenced in the sentencing of former Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK) chairman Antasari Azhar, other systematic efforts to weaken the KPK, and a wave of suicides and widespread hunger despite that the nation's economy had grown 6-percent last year.

The forum called on Yudhoyono and Boediono to be honest, courageous and firm in resolving the problems.

The forum said it would send a list of recommendations to the President and promised to call for the resignation of Yudhoyono and Boediono should the recommendations go unaddressed