Indonesian President Megawati Sukarnoputri has advised wavering voters to select the prettiest candidate in the July 5 election. "I've heard complaints that voters are confused because there are too many candidates," she said in an off-the-cuff speech after campaigning officially began. "Why confused? Just vote for the prettiest one," she said, to the cheers of about 2,000 supporters. Megawati is the only woman among five candidates in the country's first direct presidential election. The others are two former generals - her ex-security minister Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono and former military chief Wiranto - as well as her curent vice-president, Hamzah Haz and national assembly chairman Amien Rais.
Megawati, daughter of the country's first president, Sukarno, was speaking at a ceremony marking the declaration by her father in 1945 of the state ideology known as Pancasila. Support for her Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle slumped dramatically in the April 5 legislative election. The polls were won by Golkar, which backed former dictator Suharto. An opinion poll released today shows Yudhoyono with 41 per cent compared to 11.2 per cent for Megawati and 10 per cent for Wiranto. |
