Gusmao to Get More Power: Timor Leste

Rebel leaders in East Timor are planning a conference to seek ways of modifying the country’s constitution to allow greater power for President Xanana Gusmao.

Xanana Gusmao

Major Alfredo Reinado was quoted in sources as saying he is in command of the sacked soldiers at the root of the unrest and that he and his allies as well as several unnamed intellectuals are planning to hold a conference within a week to discuss the issue.

Hundreds of protesters who travelled to Dili last week to present Mr Gusmao with a petition demanding he sack Mr Alkatiri are threatening to return to the city if they do not get a response from him soon according to a Timorese journalist in Ermera, the coffee-growing region of the country's west.

All this with a backdrop of continuing violence in the country is surely to lead to a solution with no end. Why is it that these supporters of Gusmao want to give him more powers. Isn't this a dictatorship?. Definitely far removed from the democratic system applied when the Timorese went to the election ballots in 2002.