Sukarnoputri, Megawati Setyawati (1946- )

Indonesian centrist politician, president 2001-04. The daughter of Indonesia's popular founding president Sukarno, she became president in July 2001 after President Abdurrahman Wahid was removed from office by the People's Consultative Assembly after impeachment proceedings. She has pledged to end corruption, make the government more accountable, and has apologised to the separatist provinces of Aceh and Irian Jaya for human-rights abuses by past governments. However, she inherited a debt-ridden economy and a country split by ethnic divisions.

Megawati had been the leading contender for the leadership of Indonesia after the resignation in 1998 of President Suharto, who had been behind her father's removal from office in 1967. Her Indonesian Democratic Party (PDI) won most votes in the June 1999 parliamentary elections, but the People's Consultative Assembly did not select her as president in October 1999. This led to riots and the next day she was elected vice-president.

Megawati entered politics late, in 1987. In December 1993 she was elected chair of the PDI, one of two ‘opposition’ parties permitted to operate by the authoritarian Suharto regime. Concerned at the support she drew from moderate Muslims and parts of the military for her more independent and nationalistic policy stance, in June 1996 the government engineered a split in the PDI to remove her as leader. This provoked rioting in Jakarta. Despite a lack of personal political magnetism and maintaining a low public profile, Megawati is immensely popular among the working classes, largely because of her father's radical exploits.