Nala Edwin, Jakarta – The public is being encouraged to study and be on guard against the TNI’s (Indonesian military) efforts to revive the territorial commands (Koter) as a means to preserve the power of the current administration. The TNI has even been asked not to become involved in politics again.

This was conveyed to journalists by Jakarta’s former deputy-governor and elderly retired TNI officer Major General Basofi Sudirman at the Le Meridien Hotel on Jalan Sudirman in Jakarta on Tuesday October 11.

“The TNI must learn from past mistakes and not let Koter become a political tool for certain parties”, said Sudirman.

Sudirman also took the opportunity to admit he is optimistic that if the Koter is revived terrorist acts will be easy to detect. Nevertheless in order to prevent pass mistakes – that is Koter being used for certain political interests – public supervision is extremely important.

He related one of the successes of Koter when it uncovered a planned bombing of the Borobudur Temple in Central Java. At the time information on the perpetrators could be gathered by the public through Koter.

“That is the usefulness of Koter to gather as much information as possible from the public”, said the retired two-star general. (san)

[Translated by James Balowski.]