Tuesday, February 26, 2002, was an important day in the life of Vice President Hamzah Haz. On that day, during a cabinet meeting at the presidential palace, President Megawati Sukarnoputri gave him verbal instructions to take on the heavy task of handling a series of weighty and difficult economic problems, including such intractable ones as settling the scandal of misused Bank Indonesia liquidity credits.

The hope is that Megawati's verbal