Word: wahid
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...President Abdurrahman Wahid arrived at the presidential palace in central Jakarta last October, his spirits and those of the country were riding high. After 32 years of Suharto's dictatorship and 17 months of interim rule by Suharto's deputy B.J. Habibie, Indonesia was finally getting a reformist President who preached tolerance and democratic openness. But as the blind Muslim cleric and his family mounted the palace steps, a cry rang out. A dukun--a Javanese soothsayer--who habitually accompanies Wahid called the party to a halt. He said he could see the "big man," the spirit of Suharto, standing...
That authority is spreading. When Indonesia's new reformist President, Abdurrahman Wahid, visited last month, an angry crowd gathered to protest the disappearance of their relatives during the occupation. Gusmao immediately jumped off the podium and plunged into the crowd, arguing, calming and pleading until, single-handedly, he had pacified several hundred people. Then he led three of the protesters through the throng to meet Wahid. "It was amazing," says Peter Galbraith, former U.S. ambassador to Croatia, now working for the U.N. in East Timor. "There was this woman politely asking Wahid to know where her husband was buried...
President Abdurrahman Wahid may be a picture of physical frailty, but he fights smart - as former military leader General Wiranto discovered Sunday. Wiranto, who had defied Wahid's order to step down as minister for security, was summarily suspended from the cabinet Sunday, even though the president had indicated only a day earlier that the general could remain in office pending the outcome of an official investigation into his role in last year's East Timor violence. The standoff had fueled rumors of a coup against Wahid, who had asked for the resignation of Wiranto - the military leader who engineered...
...Wahid's trademark political skill has been keeping his enemies off-balance, divided and isolated. Although that's required 180-degree turnabouts on some policy questions, it's effectively neutralized most challenges thus far to his presidency - an office he acquired only by his supreme skill at backroom politicking. Despite finishing a distant third in last spring's polls, Wahid managed to shut out the presumptive president, Megawati Sukarnoputri, by cobbling together a voting bloc of Islamic parties and Suharto supporters, and then immediately headed off the violent reaction in the streets by naming Megawati as his deputy. But while...
...Wiranto, the military and Megawati aren't the only ones with axes to grind - former Suharto supporters both in the military and in the private sector are threatened by the new government's anti-corruption efforts. But Wahid is a wily politician whose coalition-building skills were evident last year when he shut out Megawati for the top job despite his relatively tiny share of the electoral vote. And until now, he's kept his opponents off balance and divided through skillfully alternating between concessions and challenges. Still, his looming showdown with Wiranto may prove to be his toughest battle...