On August 9th, the main airport on Flores, in Maumere got a new name. It was named after one of Maumere’s greatest son, the late Franciscus Xavier Seda.
Frans Seda was born in 1926 in Sikka Regency and educated, amongst other places, at the Catholic University of Tilburg in the Netherlands. He served in several capacities in both the Sukarno and Suharto governments, the most important post being one of Suharto’s first finance ministers. Later he was active outside of Suharto’s Golkar Party, having served as chairman of the Indonesian Catholic Party and as an advisor to the PDI-P, the party led today by Megawati Sukarno, the former president and Sukarno’s daughter. (There is also a connection between these two parties as the Indonesian Catholic Party was dissolved in 1971 to become part of the PDP, which is a predecessor party to the PDI-P.)
He was also committed to his Catholic faith, not just in his capacity as chairman of said Indonesian Catholic Party, but he was also instrumental in making the visit of Pope John Paul II. to Sikka Regency in 1989 a reality. Furthermore, thanks to his many national and international connections, he was also very helpful in alerting the national government and international donors to the plight of the people after the horrible earthquake on December 12th, 1992, in Sikka Regency. Frans Seda passed away on December 31st, 2009, in Jakarta.
(Sources: Flores Pos from August 16th, and Wikipedia)
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