Newly appointed Indonesian President Megawati Sukarnoputri arrives in Phnom Penh from Laos today for a brief goodwill visit.
Megawati is scheduled to spend several hours in Siem Reap this morning visiting the temples of Angkor. She lands at Pochentong Airport around 11 am and will spend today and Friday introducing herself to top government officials, Indonesian Ambassador Nazaruddin Nasution said.
Megawati and her husband, Taufiq Kiemas, will visit King Norodom Sihanouk at the Royal Palace. Prime Minister Hun Sen, Senate President Chea Sim and National Assembly President Prince Norodom Ranariddh “will pay separate courtesy calls” on Megawati at the palace, according to a Cambodian Ministry of Foreign Affairs statement.
Megawati, the former vice president, was elevated to president by parliament in July after then-President Abdurrahman Wahid was removed from office over allegations that he was corrupt and incompetent.
It is a tradition for new Indonesian leaders to visit member countries of Asean first, Indonesian Foreign Minister Hasan Wirayuda told The Associated Press Monday. Megawati, the daughter of Indonesia’s founding strongman, Sukarno, is making brief visits to the Philippines, Vietnam, Laos, Malaysia, Brunei, Singapore, Burma and Thailand during her seven-day trip.
In November 1999, the newly elected President Wahid made a brief visit to Cambodia, also as part of a goodwill tour of Asean nations.
Indonesia was a strong supporter of Cambodia’s bid to become a member of Asean. Cambodia’s admission to the regional group was stalled after the July 1997 factional fighting, but Cambodia eventually joined in 1999.
Before she was elected vice president in 1999, Megawati was known as Indonesia’s pro-democracy opposition leader. Her political party won the largest number of parliamentary seats in the June 1999 election. Protests and violence followed as parliament struggled to decide who would be president.
Many argued that Megawati was not qualified to be president, fearing she would imitate the autocratic policies of her father, and parliament voted narrowly in October 1999 to elect Wahid.
Prince Ranariddh—whose party won elections in 1993 but was forced into a power-sharing partnership with Hun Sen and the CPP—said in October 1999 that Megawati’s political role in Indonesia could not be ignored.
Prince Ranariddh also said Wahid’s election would bring “more stability” to Indonesia, the world’s fourth most populous nation. But Indonesia has since been hampered by a stagnant economy and separatist violence.
“Indonesia is one of, if not the, most important members of Asean. Anything that happens there, good or bad, will affect the Asean organization as a whole,” the prince said in 1999.
