Remarks by Adurrahman Wahid ("Gus Dur"), President of the Republic of Indonesia
At the
American Indonesian Chamber of Commerce luncheon,
June 13th, 2000
InterContinental Hotel, New York
Note: President Wahid's remarks were not from a written text and were
prepared and edited by AICC from a recording.
Welcoming remarks by Allan Harari, President of AICC:
Ladies and Gentlemen,
If I can ask you to take your place so we can get started with our program.
Excellencies, Ministers, Distinguished Guests,
About ten days ago we were informed that we�ll have a meeting, that Gus Dur will be visiting NewYork and the Chamber could arrange a small intimate lunch.
Really this is a testament to the President of the level of esteem, friendship that the New York community has for the Republic of Indonesia and for the democratically elected president. Thank You, we are very grateful for your attendance.
He has been here less than 24 hours and during that time he really achieved that many New Yorkers try in a life time to acquire.
Ladies and Gentlemen,
Please join me in welcoming H.E. Abdurrahman Wahid, President of the Republic of Indonesia.
applause
President Wahid:
Thank you.
Ladies and Gentlemen,
You know I know more about New York than Jakarta. From Dos Pasos novel about the trial tragedy of New York Manhattan Transfer, 42nd parallel (I forgot the county of Brooklyn), so I know more about the city and I�m glad to be here.
I think what I can tell you is several things: First, that yesterday I met with President Clinton. But of course I�ve to say that it�s an informal thing, that was the agreement, which will bring me more work because I�ve, in that sense, got to balance. I have to meet with George Bush Jr as well as Al Gore. I�ll be there in September, I hope that by that time the atmosphere is not so acrimonious like now.
Second thing is that the Indonesian economy is�I mean before we�ve estimated that the annual economic growth [to be] 3 to 4%, now the Managing Director of IMF, Collard, already said, it�ll be 4-l/2%. But my own experts said it�ll be 5% and looking at results of my meeting with President Clinton yesterday, then I think it higher than that. So that my estimate will reach 5.5% of economic growth can be realized this time. In that way, we will be closer to the economic revival we would like to have, especially with your help.
Second thing to tell you also is that the Cabinet has decided to take "partial approach" to the labor unrest in Indonesia. The decision of the cabinet meeting is that we will respect the right to strike only for those who has "genuine complaint." But not to those strikers you see, engineered from outside. This is important because you know the investment can�t come without that kind of assurances.
Something is that we already take steps to ensure the rule of law will take place in Indonesia as part of democratization process. That means the establishment of the national establishment and also the role of the Attorney General. The cases will be divided , those who will not go to the court will be taken by the national establishment. For the court then the Attorney General will process that.
Part of it will go to the IBRA for those people with the "economic problem." The second thing will go to the courts, under the jurisdiction of the Supreme Court of Indonesia. Because of this, we also would like to�we�ve already got the names of the Supreme Court justices for that, which is important.
Besides that, we also have establish National Council of Law, the National Law Council, in which Prof. Said Thahir, chairman, will look whether the other institutions are already obeying the law or not. So, I think with 5 organizations, the drive to the rule of law then we can more or less take care of the situation in the matter of law. Also important is that we already got the names of people who would man the National Business Council, the Business Ethic Council, in which they will like to see whether corruption happens or not in its dealings of a company.
Also important is that now we have taken the steps to improve the situation by appointing honest judges for the 5 court districts of Jakarta; so that we�ll see that the right complaints and the cases will go and [be] taken care of in the best way possible, that is through honesty. In that sense I think we will be able to establish the rule of law soon. But there are also other problems that we face. For example, the existing contradictory regulations inside the government which we have to look into and then also the quality of officials, which is important. As well as the division of work between the national and the provincial as well as local governments caused by the division of government of Indonesia.
In this respect, I would like to say also that on July 1, I'll declare that the National Police will be under the jurisdiction of the Minister of the Interior, not under the Minister of Defense like before. So, I'll make it clear the separation between the two.
In this sense, I think we would follow the situation needed to have a clean government in Indonesia as soon as possible. The most important part will be the differentiation between the work of the government and the local private sector in business, in the economy. The government will of course take pioneering work if necessary in the field of small and medium size enterprises, concentrating in agriculture. But that doesn't mean that foreign investors would be assisted. They can go into the other sectors even join in our sectors. The job of the government now is to plan economic growth in such areas�and then not taken place in the economy at all, except pioneering. And then also to encourage the private sector of society to take care, to implement the plan; and then after that to supervise, to evaluate, that the plan will be implemented, rightly or not. So I think, by that case we ensure the beginning of the good government in Indonesia and also that the government will take care of the economy, as small as possible, as little as possible.
In other things, we also follow the fact that this is important for foreign companies, that we should balance between the decentralization or autonomy progress, which is according to law to that of the interest of the international law. We have committed ourselves to several agreements according to the international law. This will be observed, this will be respected, because those agreements were reached when Suharto was in power, then for the disputed things we ask those companies and the society to negotiate, if necessary the government can preside over that.
I can say in this respect that we, I, had sent the Minister of Mining & Energy to North Sulawesi, where Newmont, a company which is concentrating in mining, was brought by the local government to the court. And, well, the Minister has been able to persuade all the people there, who were concerned about this, that the company should work with us and we should respect international law on that. I think with this kind of approach then we'll be able to show that we are consistent to our saying that we will look into the matters of the investors in let say, in a good way, in a consistent way.
What I can tell you more is that don't be afraid of the August meeting (of the National Assembly). Many people are very concerned about that (laughing), including the Foreign Minister here (laughter). He said that frankly he is concerned, he is worried about that. But please understand that before I departed from Indonesia, I had breakfast with Mrs. Megawati Sukarnoputri, the Vice President, as well with Akbar Tanjung, both you see lead the biggest political parties, the PDI-P and Golkar. Also attending that meeting was Matori Abdul Jalil from PKB. But before that, I also had another visitor, Hamzah Haz, from the PPP, together with other Islamic parties. So we agreed that we shouldn't have that kind of things: changes of government, and so forth. We abide by the idea of preserving the government for the sake of democracy. After that, I had a meeting also with Mr. Amin Rais. We reach the same solution, same agreement. Apart from that, Matori Abdul Jalil, Megawati Sukarnoputri, and Akbar Tanjung, also reached with me the agreement that I can reshuffle after the MPR session in August.
This is very important because you know now the Cabinet is the representatives of different parties. But later it'll be more consistent, will be more united in many approaches. I think we have this important agreement [on] that. While for the regional divisions of the country, I think that the best way to conclude the problem, which is already agreed upon by the Commander of the Armed Forces, is that we have to negotiate not making war. Negotiate with each other, because they'll also legitimate concerns about the State and I think that mainly the problem of separatism in Indonesia is caused by the repression of the central government in the past, a kind of protest voice. And we've to see from this point that we shall negotiate with them, not making war with them. And this has already resulted in the agreement in Geneva, between the Free Aceh Movement and us.
Also I think now there are voices from the synods of Christians in Papua as well as the diocese there that we can negotiate with the people there, with the Papuan people there. So, I think in a short time we'll be able to deal with them all. I think those other matters are important for us now and I hope that you'll be able to come to Indonesia to visit us and more important also to invest in Indonesia, because you know we can develop the country together with benefits for both sides.
Thank you very much.
applause
Allan Harari: The President has agreed to field some questions from the audience. We've some few minutes before he has to go on to his next meeting.
Ambassador Paul Wolfowitz: Mr. President. I would like to ask you to say a little bit more about how the situation in Aceh has improved over the last six months. And I say, I've been in several meetings in Baltimore and here the people's impatience and recognition for a change and how many problems in Indonesia still faces. But it seems to me, I think back to two years ago and a month when you've the most terrible riots of July in Jakarta. If anyone then had said in the next two years Indonesia will have a peaceful resignation by President Suharto, it'll have a popular election of July of 1999, that that election will be converted through a kind of Indonesian compromise, to the election of the first democratically elected president in Indonesian history, and in Aceh will begin talking about the things, the Central Government, and a list of many others, I, we would have said you're dreaming. And yet all those are happened and people are saying what are you going to do for us next. And it is important for us to add to those questions and also important to answer them. But I think you'll be helpful to this audience if you could say a little bit about what was it that you were after you were inaugurated, to change the situation in Aceh from where people thought in December there will be one million people out demonstrating for independence but now instead you're negotiating.
President Wahid: I think that the Aceh problem starts from Hassan Tiro's assurances to his followers in Aceh that the U.S. Government would support it. So it was a very great surprise for when he came here about a few months ago, before the signing, asking his deputies to sign with our government. The State Department said to him in a way they'll assist. So, because of this, there is a problem for his followers in Aceh. As Tengku Abdullah Syafei said "that we already said to the people that we'll be recognized by the US. So now how could we do that. The people will kill us."
So, because of this, the State Department sent Karen Brooks to Aceh to talk with them and the result was several people from Aceh will go to the State Department to hear directly the man responsible [for] this thing. Anticipating this, I asked the Commander of the Armed Forces and the National Police Chief to ask him about accepting the Free Aceh Movement people within their forces. They said they'll accept. The decision will be made upon a so-called physical test. If they passed the test, they can be the soldiers or whatever there in the Armed Forces or in the Police Force. Anticipating this, I said also I tried to obtain, and I was successful, in finding one hundred hectares of land north side of Cianjur, between Cianjur and Puncak, which can be tilt by those Acehnese leaders if they choose to stay outside Aceh. So between 10 to 15, between 10 to 7-1/2 hectares of land, which is enough for them to live by comfortably. I think this is the case. Thank you.
Applause
Indonesian guest: Mr. President. I'm an Indonesian but I love to address this in English, if it is possible. Probably one of the key things to have this investment coming to Indonesia is to have a so-called transparency, accountability and openness in the many country's companies, or state-enterprises. I know, a lot of progress has been going on in this area but I'm sure many of us here would like to invest to have this happening as soon as possible in a very fast pace. Are a lot more things going forward on this aspect.
President Wahid: Of course we'll abide by that. I mean transparency, rule of law, freedom of expression, and equal treatment for all people despite of their origins would be the main corner of the government, including the one that we�ve to instill in the minds of the executives of the state-companies
Well, it isn't a simple job, but I believe that we can do that and your comments means you give a heavy task to the Minister concerned about this. Thank You.
Leonard Swidler, from the Global Dialogue Institute, Temple University: Mr. President, this past February, under your patronage as you know, we held a conference there, business leaders, and business ethics and anti-corruption reform, one result to which beginning of this business ethics counsel of Indonesia that you referred earlier which will be made mainly of business people themselves. Would you care to reflect a little bit about your vision for the future where you like to see the relationship between business, ethics, and democracy in Indonesia? How do you see these major principles somehow coming together in your ultimate vision?
President Wahid: I think the first thing to remember always in this case is that the companies is investing in the country. So, think about the welfare of the society, of the citizens. So, then they contribute to these things, to those efforts to establish the welfare of the people. Besides that, of course, we have to divide clearly the sphere of the government, and the sphere of society, all the private spheres, where the foreign companies can come into. The government is already committed to the pioneering works in agriculture, using the medium and small industries or enterprises, such as SME, is important to provide a very large employment for our unemployed people.
But that doesn't prevent the companies to invest in Indonesia in many other things. It�s not the job of the government to decide which one, but anyway we'll take care that the rule of objectivity will be observed by anyone there. So, this is the gist of the matter. Beside that we have to be careful about what the IMF, World Bank, and so forth, because there was in the past the inability of the Indonesians to work with the IMF in the honest way, in the open. I said already to the IMF, that although we'll be able to repay our loans to IMF and World Bank later, but after that we'll still abide by the agreements we have, of the rules of independence, of openness, of good management and of competition as expected by the IMF.
This is very important for us because we don't want to be deviating from our original goal and that is to principally, according to the principles, we've to maintain competition and so forth. Second thing is that we'll have to stay within the framework of free international trade. I think those things should be remembered always. Thank you.
applause
Journalist:
Mr. President, I wonder if you could tell us a little bit more about your meeting with President Clinton yesterday, and, in particular if he pledged at all any support of tracking down some of the missing funds from the Suharto Administration.
President Wahid:
First, I say thanks the United States. The Americans have assisted us mainly three times, when we obtained our independence in the form of the Commission of Three States in the United Nations. And then after that when we wanted to take back Irian from the Dutch, then Attorney General Robert Kennedy did a very wonderful job of making that possible. After that, when Suharto began his New Order thing, then the American Government at that time has supported in the economy. So I asked him whether he would support us as well in our endeavor .
Now we have to stress because the new investments to Indonesia will come at a slow pace in the beginning that we've to shift into stressing export than investment. And I hope the United States will assist us by opening its doors for our goods to be exported to the United States.
He said, O.K., he'll do that. Beside that of course I asked the United States Government to understand that the approaches to the military is different, because in Indonesia it�s not possible to differentiate between the military and the civilian. Because there are good people in the military so then we have to remember always this.
We asked the United States Government to assist us in showing or persuading the
Center for Anti-Corruption to operate in Indonesia, to help us in finding out ways to stamp out corruption, and more important too also map out the amassed fortune of the Suharto family. I'm glad that also to tell to you that now we have reached the understanding with the family in the form of Tutut the eldest daughter, and Bambang Trihatmodjo, that the Presidential family would like to give back the fortune to the State pending on the negotiations on both sides. I ascribed Minister Yudhoyono to do that.
Besides that also Tutut asked for my guarantee, written guarantee, that the father will be given clemency when the court decided that he is wrong and give him the sentence. In my answer, I said to my assistant to inform her that I'll do that as soon as I get back to the country. Thank you.
applause
Harari: Mr. President, thank you very much for taking time to be with us today. (Wahid: Thank you) The Chamber has a small token. We know of your love for music and we know of your movement around you don't know the time when you sit in front of your stereo. So, I think we've a complete package to relax you.
Ladies and Gentlemen, thank you very much.
Wahid: Thank you for the present.
Applause
===========================================================