Paul Somohardjo, chairman of Pertjajah Luhur (PL), blames the vengeful attitude of the chairman of ABOP, Ronnie Brunswijk, for the tensions between the PL and ABOP. According to Somohardjo, Brunswijk is deeply disappointed that his dream of becoming president has gone up in smoke. This is the main reason why high ranking members of the PL who held high posts within the government have been given the boot.
“The dream of becoming president has gone up in smoke and it hurts him,” said Somohardjo at a meeting of the PL last Saturday. Somohardjo accused Brunswijk of setting a boobytrap for the PL by demanding that the PL had to be ‘absorbed’ by ABOP. The main objective was to remove the PL from the political arena. Somohardjo claimed that in the past ABOP had attempted to do the same to other parties that had formed the A Combination with ABOP. “He almost tricked us,” said Somohardjo.
The ties between the PL and ABOP started to show cracks because of this conflict. “A joint venture between ABOP and the PL could have brought the dream of Brunswijk within his reach but the PL refuses to be fused with ABOP. Brunswijk has turned this disappointment in a personal vendetta against the PL. The PL has suffered huge losses because of the joint venture with ABOP. As a result of the joint venture with ABOP we dropped from 35,000 votes to 15,000 votes,” said Somohardjo who added that he has noticed a positive change after he ended the joint venture as many Javanese voters want to return to the PL…[+]