Indonesian President Appoints Election Rival as Defense Minister

JAKARTA, Indonesia (AP) Indonesian President Joko Widodo on Wednesday named his defeated election rival, a former general linked to human rights abuses, as defense minister and added entrepreneurs and technocrats to his cabinet to address slowing growth in Southeast Asia's largest economy.

The lineup also includes politicians from Widodo's governing coalition who backed his victory in April's controversial election. Widodo, 58, was sworn in on Sunday for his second and final five-year term with a pledge to defend democracy and take bolder action against poverty and entrenched corruption in the world's fourth most populous country.

In the announcement at the presidential palace, Widodo instructed his cabinet and institutional leaders to fight corruption by creating a system to eliminate any possibility of corruption.

“Don't be corrupt!” Widodo told the ministers. “Be serious at work, and those who are not, I will exclude them from this cabinet,” he warned.

Last month's violent student protests against a law they say was crippling the country's anti-corruption agency, which underscores the challenge of fighting corruption, threatened the credibility of Widodo, who was re-elected after making campaign for clean governance.

Indonesia ranks 89th out of 175 countries in the 2018 Corruption Perceptions Index compiled by Transparency International.

Defense Minister Prabowo Subianto, 68, lost two presidential elections to Widodo, is a former special forces general and founder and leader of the Gerindra political party.

Widodo, better known as Jokowi, had repeatedly said Indonesians needed to unite after a difficult election campaign. He and his defeated rival met in July for the first time since April's vote and Subianto negotiated government positions, marking an easing of tensions.

Subianto initially refused to accept the results of the vote, and nine people died in the riots that followed the vote in Jakarta. The country's Supreme Court ruled his allegations of massive and systematic fraud unfounded and rejected his challenge to the election results in June.

Human rights activists see Subianto's appointment as a conservative backlash against Widodo's efforts to address Indonesia's poor human rights record.

“This is a dark day for human rights and justice in Indonesia,” said Andreas Harsono, Indonesia researcher at Human Rights Watch.

Subianto has been accused of abuses during President Suharto's authoritarian rule, and he has allied himself politically with groups that want Islamic law to prevail over secular law in Indonesia. He won large victories in conservative provinces, but mainstream Muslim organizations and minority voters backed Widodo, who won 55.5 percent of the vote in official results.

In other Cabinet appointments, Sri Mulyani Indrawati was reappointed as finance minister. Indrawati, a popular 57-year-old reformer, has been praised for overhauling a corrupt tax department and steering the economy through the 2008 global financial crisis and the current global economic slowdown.

Edhy Prabowo, vice president of Subianto's party, was named minister of Marine and Fisheries, replacing Susi Pudjiastuti, who became famous for seizing and blowing up hundreds of foreign fishing boats caught in the act poaching in Indonesian waters.

Nadiem Makarim, 35, CEO and co-founder of the start-up Gojek, was appointed Minister of Education and Culture, and Erick Thohir, 49, former owner of the Inter Milan football club, was appointed Minister of State. owned companies.

As Indonesia's first president from outside Jakarta's elite, Widodo had promised to promote professionals rather than party officials, who in Indonesia have a reputation for corruption and laziness.

However, economic analyst Bhima Yudhistira of the Institute for Development of Economics and Finance said market players were unhappy that Widodo's new team had too many politicians in key economic positions.

Yudhistira said more than 170 billion rupees ($12 million) of foreign funds left the capital market soon after the Cabinet announcement on Wednesday morning.

“Many people regret Jokowi's political coalition, which is too big,” Yudhistira said. “This encourages him to appoint people to his cabinet who are not based on their background and professionalism, whether they are economic teams or not.”

He said that only Finance Minister Indrawati is credible in the eyes of the business community, because other economic positions are occupied by politicians, including the coordinating minister of economy and the ministers of social affairs, industry and trade.

Indonesia, the world's most populous Muslim-majority nation and a democratic outpost in Southeast Asia, is expected to be among the world's largest economies by 2030.

Widodo has been widely praised for his efforts to improve Indonesia's inadequate infrastructure and reduce poverty, which affects nearly a tenth of the country's roughly 270 million people.