SULTAN GIVES KALLA-WIRANTO PAIR MORAL SUPPORT

Yogyakarta, May 19 (ANTARA) - Golkar Party presidential candidate Jusuf Kalla (JK) said Yogyakarta Governor Sri Sultan Hamengku Buwono X had given him and his running mate Wiranto moral support in the face of the upcoming presidential race.

"When the three of us, JK-Wiranto-Sri Sultan, sit together like we are doing now, it means that he (the Sultan) is giving us moral support," Kalla said after a meeting with the Yogyakarta governor at Yogyakarta Palace here on Tuesday.

The tripartite meeting among Jusuf Kalla, Wiranto, and Sri Sultan was closed to the media but they later gave a joint press conference.

At the press conference Kalla said his relations with the sultan were of long standing because they were members of the same party (Golkar). In addition, he said, the Bugis community and the Yogyakarta Palace also had good relations.

"At our meeting, we discussed a lot of things related to national self-reliance," Kalla said, adding that the JK-Wiranto duo for the upcoming presidential election was an archipelagic pair.

Meanwhile, Sri Sultan said since the era of the Mataram kingdom, the peoples of Yogyakarta and Bugis Makassar had always had good relations.

The Sultan said the people-oriented economy and the national resilience had been fought for since the Mataram kingdom.

"Mataram's invasions into Batavia in the past was intended to attain national resilience and therefore it should continue to be fought for," the Sultan said.

Meanwhile, Golkar cadre Priyo Budi Santoso said the JK-WIN duo made a friendly call to the Yogyakarta Palace on Tuesday morning but he could not deny that the call, which was actually also a political meeting, was part of an effort to gain moral support from the Yogyakarta governor for the upcoming July 8 presidential election.

"Sri Sultan Hamengku Buwono X is also a member of the Golkar Party's steering committee like such other Golkar figures such as Surya Paloh and Aburizal Bakrie in the JK-WIN success team," Priyo Budi Santoso said.

He said Jusuf Kalla on the occasion was accompanied by members of his success team, among others Sumarsono, Priyo Budi Santoso, Gandung Pardiman, and Drajat Wiboso, a politician from National Mandate Party (PAN), while Wiranto was accompanied by People's Conscience Party (Hanura) figures Yus Usman, Subagyo HS, Fuad Bawazier, and Fahrul Rozi.