SBY cuts short Japan trip following public outcry at home

Indonesia President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono will cut short his Japan trip to return home following a public outcry over a law that abolishes direct local elections was passed on Friday.

Yudhoyono is scheduled to leave Osaka four hours ahead of his schedule, where he received an honorary doctorate from Ritsumeikan University Kyoto.

The outgoing president, who will leave office on Oct 20, is expected to meet with members of the Indonesia’s Constitutional Court to discuss the recently passed controversial law that abolishes direct elections of regional leaders, according to Jakarta Post.

The bill, that caused major outcry among the public, lambasted Yudhoyono’s Democractic Party for walking out of the House of Representatives’ (DPRD) plenary session that ended with the passage of the law.

Yudhoyono, as the party’s chairman, was largely blamed because he allegedly allowed his lawmakers - 125 out of 130 – to walk out after the House rejected their proposed 10 points of improvement for direct elections.

Angry citizens turned to social media with the hashtags #ShameOnYouSBY and #RIPDemocracy since Friday in response to the development, widely seen as a setback for Indonesia’s democracy.

selamat buat bpak SBY yang telah melupakan hak rakyat #ShameOnYouSBY
— rodiana (@AnaRodiana) September 29, 2014

How can u turn ur back on democracy u were elected on? @SBYudhoyono #ShamedByYou #ShameOnYouSBY
— Ary Widyandarto (@wytuit) September 28, 2014

#ShameOnYouSBY Ironic.The first president to be elected directly by the people just took away the voting rights of the people. What a shame
— Andy Budiman Kumala (@abkumala) September 27, 2014

Yudhoyono, the country’s sixth president, had previously publicly declared his full support for the direct-election system through a video uploaded to the party’s Youtube account.

Meanwhile, Indonesian election watchdogs were among a number of organizations planning to file a judicial review to the Constitutional Court against the passed law, which they claimed is against the spirit of ‘regional autonomy‘ as clearly stated in Article 18 of the Constitution, Jakarta Globe reported on Monday.

By scrapping direct votes, the outcome of regional elections in councils will be very much controlled by political party elites in Jakarta, said Indonesian Voter Committee, or Tepi Indonesia.