Small groups of Indonesian students protested in Jakarta yesterday, shouting their support for the opposition leader, Ms Megawati Sukarnoputri, and their anger at an IMF bail-out agreement.
A group of 30 Indonesian students wearing red headbands marched to the national parliament building, chanting "Megawati for president". They carried a large banner which said "Support Megawati, support reform".
Ms Megawati, daughter of Indonesia's founding leader, Sukarno, on Saturday called on President Suharto to step aside in March after more than three decades in office. She also said she was ready to be a presidential candidate if called upon by the people.
A handful of police kept a close eye on the students but did not intervene. In previous protests arrests have been followed by months of imprisonment. The students later sang patriotic songs on the steps of the parliament building and sat in its foyer.
Separately, 25 students from the Indonesian Communication Forum of Jakarta Muslim Students protested outside the Finance Ministry in central Jakarta as the visiting US Deputy Treasury Secretary, Mr Lawrence Summers, met Mr Suharto. The students carried a banner saying "We love rupiah and reject the IMF" and sold posters attacking as the IMF "the agent of capitalist countries".
Indonesia agreed sweeping economic reforms with the International Monetary Fund in October in exchange for a $43 billion bailout. Mr Summers is one of several senior US and IMF officials in Jakarta to give support to Indonesia.
Ms Megawati was ousted as head of the Indonesian Democratic Party (PDI) in 1996 by government-backed rivals, despite her widespread popularity, in a move analysts said was linked to government fears she could rival the ageing Mr Suharto.
Her call for him to quit came after the rupiah currency plummeted to 10,000 to the dollar in the wake of a national budget handed down a week ago that analysts ridiculed for its optimistic economic projections.
Ms Megawati's advisers said yesterday she would take no concrete steps to move her candidacy forward and would first wait for reaction from Indonesia's 200 million people.
They said they hoped a member of the 1,000-member People's Consultative Assembly (MPR), which elects Indonesia's president and is packed with Suharto loyalists, would have the courage to nominate her as a candidate.
The US Defence Secretary, Mr William Cohen, yesterday pledged Washington's firm support for Indonesia's efforts to overcome its financial crisis. Mr Cohen arrived in Indonesia for security talks with Mr Suharto and senior officials on the second leg of a seven nation Asian tour.
"My message is that we are a strong, reliable partner to the Indonesian people and to all of the people in this region. We are here in good times and in bad," Mr Cohen told reporters.
Washington has had uneasy relations in the past year with this chiefly-Muslim state of more than 14,000 islands. The Jakarta government in September signed a letter of agreement to buy 12 Sukhoi Su-30K fighters and eight helicopters from Russia in a deal worth more than $500 million. But it has since announced a delay. Last June, Indonesia, angered by US Congressional criticism of its human rights record, cancelled a deal to buy nine US F-16 aircraft and withdrew from a US military training programme.
The United States wants to improve its military ties with Indonesia and last year sent C-130 firefighting planes and crews to Indonesia to help in fighting brush fires that blanketed much of the region in dense smoke for months.
Indonesia's ruling Golkar party said yesterday it would nominate Mr Suharto for a seventh term in office in presidential elections scheduled for March.
Mr Suharto has come under unprecedented pressure to step down after allegations he has mishandled attempts to pull Indonesia out of its worst economic crisis in decades. But his renomination for the presidency by Golkar has never been in doubt.