Shortly after his inauguration as the new commander of the Indonesian National Armed Forces (TNI), Air Chief Marshal Hadi Tjahjanto took the unprecedented step of annulling a reshuffle of senior officers initiated by his predecessor, General Gatot Nurmantyo. The reshuffle was carried out just four days before Gen Gatot was to formally hand over the commandership of the military to his successor on 8 December 2017.

In the last three months of 2017, Gen Gatot did two reshuffles: one on 27 October and the other on 4 December. Unlike the reshuffle of 27 October, the 4 December leadership changes were puzzling. The second reshuffle involved 85 officers consisting 46 from the army, 28 from the Navy and 11 from the Air Force. It was baffling why Gen Gatot shifted some officers who previously held strategic appointments to lesser positions. For example, Maj Gen Imam Edy Mulyono, formerly Chief of Staff of the Army’s Strategic and Reserve Command (Kostrad), was reassigned as “Special Staff to the Army Chief of Staff”. Another rotation which attracted public attention was the replacement of Lt Gen Edy Rachmayadi as Kostrad commander by Maj Gen Sudirman who was the Security Assistant to the Army’s Chief of Staff.

… Chaula Anindya is a Research Analyst and Satrio Dwicahyo a Research Associate with the Indonesia Programme, S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies (RSIS), Nanyang Technological University, Singapore.

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