Jakarta, NU Online
General Chairman of the country's largest Muslim organization, Nahdlatul Ulama (NU), KH Said Aqil Siroj said that Joko Widodo was a president democratically elected by the people and had to determine the direction of his people's fate. Although he was nominated by a particular party, he should not be subject to the interests of the party. "The interests of the people should be a priority over the interests of others."<>

"What happened (and) we watch every day is a great touchstone for the current administration. It is really difficult, but if Mr. Jokowi could overcome this problem, it would be easy. But if he could not, then his popularity will continue to decline," he told NU Online here on Tuesday (17/2).

Regarding the pre-trial ruling in favor of the Police chief candidate Budi Gunawan, he respected the decision.

"The decision should be respected, whether Budi Gunawan will be sworn in or not, that is the president's prerogaative power," he said.

Separately, political expert Karel Susetyo has said that President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo must immediately inaugurate Comr. Gen. Budi Gunawan as National Police chief after South Jakarta District Court judge Sarpin Rizaldi fulfilled a pretrial request filed by Budi to invalidate the Corruption Eradication Commission’s (KPK) move to name the latter a graft suspect.

“All parties must honor the judge’s decision over the pretrial request and respect President Jokowi’s decision to inaugurate Budi as new National Police chief. The inauguration will end the political polemics and chaos of the last few weeks,” said Karel, who is also POINT Indonesia executive director, as quoted by Antara news agency in Jakarta on Monday.

In the court hearing this morning, Sarpin ruled that Budi’s status as a graft suspect was invalid.

“The determining of the plaintiff [Budi] as a suspect by the accused [the KPK] is not valid and not based upon the law,” he said.

The judge said the antigraft body’s Sprindik (letter ordering the start of an investigation) No. 03/01/01/2005 was not legal. A further investigation into the case conducted by the KPK was thus invalid, as neither Budi’s suspect status nor the Sprindik were legal, he added.

Karel said that with today’s pretrial request decision, there was no more excuse for Jokowi to delay Budi’s inauguration.

The analyst further said that the decision offered an opportunity for the President to rearrange the National Police, as it had lost solidity over the last several weeks. Moreover, there are indications that several generals had played roles in the prolonged conflict between the KPK and the National Police.

“With a definitive chief, the National Police will have to be solid again to continue carrying out its main duties,” said Karel.

He further said that Jokowi did not need to intervene in the legal cases involving KPK leaders. Instead, he said, the President must let the legal process continue to run, as Budi did when he chose to file a pretrial request to challenge his being named a graft suspect.

“We have spent too much energy on the debate over the installation of a new National Police chief. Now it’s over and President Jokowi must continue to focus his attention on other issues, developing people’s prosperity as mandated in the Nawa Cita [Jokowi’s nine-point development program],” said Karel.

Editing by Sudarto Murtaufiq