Yogyakarta – Scores of demonstrators from the Student Struggle Center for National Liberation (Pembebasan) held an action in front of the Gajah Mada University traffic circle on Friday January 28 demanding that the government of President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono (SBY) and Vice President Boediono resign because they have become loyal servants of capitalism in Indonesia.

Action coordinator Arif Hasibuan charged that right from the start the government has created problems and experienced economic and political disorientation. Moreover it has increasingly asserted its support for imperialism.

“Many developments have the potential to become the grounds for evictions and the expropriation of people’s land. The government even raised basic electricity rates without considering the interests of the ordinary people and workers. The root of the problem with the government’s policies is that they are never pro-people and are only orientated towards the capitalist economy”, he said.

According to Arif, the government’s dependency on the capitalist economic and political system along with its loyalty to capitalist institutions confirms that it is quite reasonable that the Yudhoyono government be overthrown. The government fails to improve the people’s standard of living but sacrifices them as fuel for the survival of capitalism.

“We hold to the position that the struggle to change the capitalist system not only requires the overthrow of the SBY-Boediono regime but also eliminating the indecisive political elite”, he added. (Ran)

[Translated by James Balowski.]