A new political party, the PDP, Partai Demokrasi Pembaruan, has been offically launched, a split-off from the PDI-P of Megawati.

A breakaway faction of the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P) has officially registered as the country’s 28th political party, a move that the party faithful opine will spell doom and gloom for the PDI-P, which won 20% in the 2004 elections.

Hundreds of party leaders and supporters from the Renewal Democratic Party (Partai Demokrasi Pembaruan – PDP) disturbed traffic on Thursday as they long-marched ten km’s from their party headquarters on Jalan Sisingamangaraja in south Jakarta to the Justice and Human Rights Ministry in Kuningan, also south Jakarta.

Laksamana Sukardi, a former state enterprises minister under president Megawati Soekarnoputri, and now a PDP heavyweight, said the party was set up to reform Indonesia’s political culture, which he said remained “feudalistic”, and to defend pluralism.

The PDP was actually created in December 2005 when senior leaders split from the nationalist PDI-P, after a group lead by Laksamana lost a bitter fight to engage in thoroughgoing party reform at its national congress. The party, which has a leadership council instead of a single leader, has become the 14th new party to register since the 2004 election.

Laksamana claimed that PDP membership numbers were in the millions and he was optimistic it would out-perform the PDI-P 2009 general elections. He said the party was an inclusive, nationalist grouping, which would promote pluralism through a reinterpretation of the state ideology Pancasila and a return to principles enshrined in the Constitution.

The PDP has already established chapters in 32 provinces, branches in 70 percent of regencies and municipalities and 60 percent of the nation’s subdistricts. The Political Party Law requires all political groups to field offices in at least in 50 percent of provinces, and branches in at least 50 percent of regions and 25 percent of subdistricts throughout the country.

Roy B.B. Janis, a member of the party’s leadership council, said the registration was planned to coincide with the 61st anniversary of the state ideology, Pancasila, and.

PDP is open all people regardless of their ethnicity, race and religion. We fully support Indonesia as a unitary state.

The problem that the PDP is likely to encounter is the lack of a popular figure like Megawati, considering that personalities are the most important aspect in Indonesian politics. Without such a leading figure one wonders about their ability to take much away from the PDI-P.