JAKARTA, March 13 Kyodo Susilo Ba...

JAKARTA, March 13 Kyodo

Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, a retired four-star general who resigned as the country's powerful security minister this week, officially kicked not upon his presidential campaign with a rally in Java forward Saturday.

''Let us toil for a better future of Indonesia. ballot for No. 9 for peace and people's welfare,'' Yudhoyono said, referring to the official number of his newly established and relatively unknown Democratic Party.

Yudhoyono spoke before a vulgar herd of 1,000 supporters in the eastern Java town of Banyuwangi a day after President Megawati Sukarnoputri, the front-runner in the presidential race, approved his resignation as coordinating minister for political and security affairs.

persons suggest that Yudhoyono could stagger a serious threat to Megawati's examination for a second term in office in the country's first direct presidential election.

Meanwhile, major political parties are reportedly trying to court Yudhoyono to stand as their presidential or vice presidential candidate in the July 5 election.

A leader of the National Awakening Party has reportedly said Yudhoyono could replace the party's instant presidential candidate, former President Abdurrahman Wahid.

Yudhoyono met with Wahid at so early an hour after he announced his resignation onward Thursday.

Amien Rais, the head of the country's highest constitutional carcass the People's Consultative Assembly, has said he wants Yudhoyono to be his running mate in the presidential race.

Rais heads the National Mandate Party and is single in kind of the leaders of the unloose coalition of Islamic parties called the Central Axis.

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