(An edited version of this article was published in The Australian under the title: "Wiranto's Gamble on Power.")

Things change very fast in Indonesia in these last few days. On May 21 stepped down dramatically, Suharto after being president for 32 years. However, the euphoria of the students that had fought for months for Suharto resignation was being held because Habibie, a close confidant of Suharto, has replaced the president. The situation is, as an observer called it, "change without change." It is still the old wine in the new bottle.

In the evening of May 22, the Comander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces General Wiranto surprisingly sacked his opponent Lt. General Prabowo Subianto, the Commander of the powerful Strategic Reserve Army Command and also the son-in-law of Suharto. Together with him was sacked also some of Prabowo's close confidants, among others Maj. General Muchdi, the Comander of the powerful Special Army Troop, the "red barret" Kopasus. With this move, Wiranto has made himself as the most powerful man in Indonesia now.

Let me expalin.
Before Suharto stepped down, Prabowo was defending Habibie during the latter's nomination as vice-president. Parbowo is the military connection of Habibie. Immediately after Habibie was installed as president, there was a strong rumor that Prabowo would replaced Wiranto as the Armed Forces Commander. Although this did not happen, it is still a common understanding that Habibie and Prabowo has worked as a team.
On the other side is Wiranto. He got his top job as the Armed Forces Commander from Suharto, after serving the president as former adjutant. Unlike Prabowo, Wiranto has been so far known as an a-political professional soldier. People say Suharto put Wiranto in this military top position in order to balance Prabowo, whom albeit his son-in-law, is not fully trusted by the president. Prabowo is considered too ambitious and too clever. Also his father, the respected senior economist Prof. Dr. Sumitro Djojohadikusumo, is not always defending the government. Lately, Prof. Sumitro has supported Emil Salim who, with his other academicians from the respected Universitas Indonesia took a critical stance against Suharto.

After Habibie became president, there has been three forces operating in the Indonesian political arena. First, Habibie and Prabowo, supported also by some Moslem group mobilized by the Indonesian Moslem Intellectual Association in which Habibie was the first chairman. Second, Wiranto with his control over the military as the Armed Forces Commander. Third, the students and the intellectuals/academicians that rally behind Emil Salim.
It is almost certain that Salim will get the support of the IMF/World Bank people, because he has been known as an honest, clever and respected economist-cum-intellectual.

The sacking of Prabowo has trigger a new element in the Indonesian political arena. The main question is: On whose behalf Wiranto took this action ?.

There are two possibilities:
1. Wiranto is acting on the military behalf, to defend the military interest to keep its power. It is well known that the military doesn't like Habibie, because the latter has taken many lucrative military industries under his department when he was the Minister of Technology. By sacking Prabowo, Habibie lost his military connection. Without a military connection, Habibie political position is extremely weak.

2. It is possible that Habibie, knowing Prabowo has been very unpopular among the military, suddenly realized his mistake and quickly changed his ally to Wiranto. Prabowo is unpopular among the military because his promotion went too fast with the help of his father-in-law Suharto. He is mockingly named as the "toll-road general." Also he is held responsible for the kidnaping, torturing and shooting the student demonstrants in these last few months. Realizing all these, Habibie tries to strengthen his position by changing his alliance from Prabowo to Wiranto.

Thus, Wiranto is acting on Habibie behalf, for the new created team between himslef and Habibie. However, the result is that now Habibie depends very much on Wiranto.

Either way will make Wiranto emerge as the new strong man in Indonesia.His next step, if he has the ambition to become the next strong man of this republic, is to ally with the existing people power and force Habibie to step down. The strong anti-Habibie sentiment among the people and the students would make it easy for Wiranto to do that.

After he has done this, the other step to be taken by Wiranto is to work with Emil Salim and his supporters to set up a new government. Wiranto could become the president and Emil his vice-president, or the other way around, depending how the civilian could enhance their bargaining power.

Either way, the new government would get the domestic political support it needs, as well as the support of international capital and international financial institutions. Especially when they succed in forming a new cabinet in which the spirit of political and economic reforms could be strongly reflected.

For people like me who participated in the birth of the New Order government in 1966, there is a strong feeling that history is being repeated. What the Indonesians have to do now is to make sure that this time they would not make the same mistake, namely that it would produce another corrupt military dhtmlator like Suharto. (End)

* Prof. Arief Budiman is the Head of the Indonesia Program of the MelbourneInstitute for Asian Languages and Societies at The University of Melbourne