Surabaya, NU Online
Supporters of Yenny Wahid’s National Awakening Party (PKB) splinter group asked the daughter of late party founder and former president KH Abdurrahman “Gus Dur” Wahid to form a new party as hopes for the party to unite fade.
They issued the call during the national congress of Yenny’s PKB faction (commonly called the Gus Dur PKB) in Surabaya, East Java, on Monday, saying that it was best for Yenny to form a new party should the party’s official leader, Muhaimin Iskandar, decline her offer to mend ties. />
Muhaimin’s PKB won a court ruling in June 2008 and to be recognized as the official PKB. Muhaimin ignored an invitation to attend the congress, calling Yenny’s organization illegal.
The formation of a new party would be another blow to the embattled PKB, which faces the possibility of not having a seat in the House of Representatives after the 2014 elections, as the House is mulling a revision to the political parties law to raise the parliamentary threshold from 2.5 percent to between 3 and 5 percent.
An Indonesian Survey Circle (LSI) study in October showed support for the PKB dropped to 3.4 percent from 4.9 percent in the 2009 elections due to the protracted rift between Yenny and Gus Dur’s nephew Muhaimin.
The secretary-general East Java branch of Yenny’s PKB faction, Niko Ainul Yakin, claimed his splinter group had enough resources to form a new party because it already had branches in all regions of the country.
“As political and administrative efforts [at reconciliation] are untenable, the best option is to form a new party and totally disassociate ourselves from the existing party,” Niko told The Jakarta Post at the two-day congress, which ended Monday.
He added that plans to form a new party plan had to be executed as soon as possible to prepare for the elections in 2014.
The amended political parties law stipulates that each party, including those with seats in the House, had to be verified two and a half years before the next general elections.
Congress committee chief Imron Rosyadi Hamid said the Gus Dur PKB gave Muhaimin’s PKB until March next year to accept their invitation to mend ties.
Imron was quoted as saying by news portal tempointeraktif.com that he hoped his rival group would acknowledge the offer and merge with the Gus Dur PKB.
Yenny, who was elected by 29 of the party’s 33 branches at the congress as chairwoman of the splinter group for the next five years, said she would prioritize saving the PKB through reconciliation.
“I will arrange a meeting with Muhaimin after this congress. If all efforts to merge fail, we are open to the idea of forming a new party,” she said.
The same idea was also brought up earlier this year following the death of Gus Dur.
Indo Barometer political analyst Muhammad Qodari agreed Yenny should form a new party, saying it would serve to represent the millions of voters who were followers of Gus Dur’s legacy. He said he believed it was more effective to form a brand new party than to compete with Muhaimin’s PKB to rebuild the PKB.
“Gus Dur’s name is a great magnet to gain votes,” he said, adding that Yenny should follow the example of Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P) chairwoman Megawati Soekarnoputri rather than waste time trying to come to a compromise.
Marwan Ja’far of Muhaimin’s PKB said in a text message received by the Post that his group would be happy if Yenny formed a new party. “We will be relieved because they won’t bother us anymore,” he said. (dar)
Supporters of Yenny Wahid’s National Awakening Party (PKB) splinter group asked the daughter of late party founder and former president KH Abdurrahman “Gus Dur” Wahid to form a new party as hopes for the party to unite fade.
They issued the call during the national congress of Yenny’s PKB faction (commonly called the Gus Dur PKB) in Surabaya, East Java, on Monday, saying that it was best for Yenny to form a new party should the party’s official leader, Muhaimin Iskandar, decline her offer to mend ties.
Muhaimin’s PKB won a court ruling in June 2008 and to be recognized as the official PKB. Muhaimin ignored an invitation to attend the congress, calling Yenny’s organization illegal.
The formation of a new party would be another blow to the embattled PKB, which faces the possibility of not having a seat in the House of Representatives after the 2014 elections, as the House is mulling a revision to the political parties law to raise the parliamentary threshold from 2.5 percent to between 3 and 5 percent.
An Indonesian Survey Circle (LSI) study in October showed support for the PKB dropped to 3.4 percent from 4.9 percent in the 2009 elections due to the protracted rift between Yenny and Gus Dur’s nephew Muhaimin.
The secretary-general East Java branch of Yenny’s PKB faction, Niko Ainul Yakin, claimed his splinter group had enough resources to form a new party because it already had branches in all regions of the country.
“As political and administrative efforts [at reconciliation] are untenable, the best option is to form a new party and totally disassociate ourselves from the existing party,” Niko told The Jakarta Post at the two-day congress, which ended Monday.
He added that plans to form a new party plan had to be executed as soon as possible to prepare for the elections in 2014.
The amended political parties law stipulates that each party, including those with seats in the House, had to be verified two and a half years before the next general elections.
Congress committee chief Imron Rosyadi Hamid said the Gus Dur PKB gave Muhaimin’s PKB until March next year to accept their invitation to mend ties.
Imron was quoted as saying by news portal tempointeraktif.com that he hoped his rival group would acknowledge the offer and merge with the Gus Dur PKB.
Yenny, who was elected by 29 of the party’s 33 branches at the congress as chairwoman of the splinter group for the next five years, said she would prioritize saving the PKB through reconciliation.
“I will arrange a meeting with Muhaimin after this congress. If all efforts to merge fail, we are open to the idea of forming a new party,” she said.
The same idea was also brought up earlier this year following the death of Gus Dur.
Indo Barometer political analyst Muhammad Qodari agreed Yenny should form a new party, saying it would serve to represent the millions of voters who were followers of Gus Dur’s legacy. He said he believed it was more effective to form a brand new party than to compete with Muhaimin’s PKB to rebuild the PKB.
“Gus Dur’s name is a great magnet to gain votes,” he said, adding that Yenny should follow the example of Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P) chairwoman Megawati Soekarnoputri rather than waste time trying to come to a compromise.
Marwan Ja’far of Muhaimin’s PKB said in a text message received by the Post that his group would be happy if Yenny formed a new party. “We will be relieved because they won’t bother us anymore,” he said. (dar)
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