Waruno Mahdi’s

Virtual WebLOG — English II

— Indonesia & Neighbors —

The OPM attacked a police station in January, but that failed to cause an outbreak of violence. Then the military sweeped the area, and failing to catch the OPM members, went on a rampage against civilians, killing more than a dozen men and women.

That caused the outbreak of violence!

The OPM are surely grateful to the military for that, and will be sure to repeat such attacks, because it proved so easy to provoke the military.

How sad, that some people just don't learn their lessons.

In your May 21 editorial, 'A nation awakes', you write that, after the founding of Budi Utomo in 1908, it took 20 years before the concept of a unified country or nation called Indonesia emerged, i.e. in 1928.

This is a very widespread error. In reality, the concept of a unitary state bearing the name Indonesia was formulated by Suwardi Suryaningrat (the later Ki Hajar Dewantara) in an address at a memorial meeting to celebrate the 10th anniversary of Budi Utomo in 1918. It was published in the same year on pp. 27-48 in: Soembangsih, Gedenkboek Boedi-Oetomo 1908-20 Mei-1918, Amsterdam: Nederlandsch Indie Oud & Nieuw (1918). The author spoke of an "Indonesian state unity' (Indonesische Staatseenheid; see p. 47).

The concept of common belonging to one country named Indonesia soon became widespread among Islamic as well as among leftist activists at home as well as abroad. The student organisation in Cairo called itself 'Indonesian' since around 1923, and the delegation headed by Mohammad Hatta to the 6th International Peace Congress in Paris in 1926 was also officially established as the delegation of 'Indonesia'. It is perhaps also worth mentioning, that even the communists in Indonesia referred to themselves as 'Indonesian' since 1924.

It's high time, I think, that the urban legend of emergence of the concept of a unitary Indonesia only in 1928 is dismissed. When young Indonesians from the various islands met in 1928 to pledge to a unitary Indonesia, the concept had been nurtured by their elders for 10 years already.

Best regards,
Waruno Mahdi

I sympathize wholeheartedly with Donna Woodward's cry of despair over the dexterity of burocrats who use literal interpretations to obviate due process of the law. Nevertheless, I beg to disagree with her plea for greater interpretational flexibility.

Respect for the letter of the law is a fundamental principle in democratic society and government by rule of law, and is still very lacking in this country. The reason why its implementation has had the atrocious workings Donna Woodward rightly deplores, is the arbitrariness of only respecting the letter of the law when it serves certain ulterior motives of influential persons.

At the present stage, it seems much more important to at first reach general and universal implementation of the letter of the law. When one has succeeded in reaching this still distant aim, there will always be time to also learn to weigh statutory intent against legal text. Even then, one will always have to accept occasional failures in enforcement of the law. The wisdom of letting a crook lose because of some formal procedural error, for sake of the higher value of conformity with the law, I think, is actually a principle of legality implying a relatively advanced degree of civic maturity.

Sincerely,
Waruno Mahdi

Mike Subritzky's letter on Sino-Indonesian refugees wrongly associated Indonesian Muslims with clandestinely financed terror groups claiming to be Muslim activists in Indonesia. But the described crimes against Sino-Indonesians were not committed even by these.

Published evidence sugests complicity of state apparatus of the previous regime. Indonesians, Muslim and other, have overthrown the head of that responsible regime. But the apparatus is still very much intact, blackmailing democratic government and pro-democracy public.

The present refugees are poor wretches caught between two fronts. Having fled Indonesia after the May 1998 violence and weeks of defencelessness, when not getting raped or one's throat slit was a matter of accidentally not being in the wrong place at the wrong time, they are deeply traumatized. They didn't come to NZ for fun, or to bring damage to you. They'd probably love nothing more than to return to Indonesia in peace. But the peace in their minds will probably never be restored again, and they have to make with exile in a far, unfamiliar, cold country, instead of the comfort of their homeland.

But they face a coldhearted burocrat trying to get rid of them with some slick legal formulas. So they answer in kind, and fight for their lives with stories that fit the required data input for those slick formulas. Killing in self defence is not a crime anywhere, I think, so Indonesian Muslims needn't feel insulted.

Mr. Subritzky's summary libel of some 180 million Muslims is perhaps not as dammaging as the actual criminals' still walking around free and gloating even over the president. There's hardly anything more damaging, I think, than criminals walking around demonstratively showing their impunity.

Sincerely,
Waruno Mahdi

Mike Subritzky has meanwhile sent me a clarifying reply

I was deeply shaken by your report, that authorities are planning to evacuate 200,000 Irianese from North Maluku and to resettle them in Biak in West Irian. Instead of protecting the Irianese settlers on the spot, they are forcing them back to their island of origin.

Irianese settlements in all parts of Indonesia outside West Irian are a concrete manifestation of West Irianese unity with the rest of Indonesia. Forcing them back to Irian runs parallel with the tendency to separate West Irian from the rest of Indonesia.

How could the responsible authorities be so nearsighted, or is that what they are in fact clandestinely driving at?

Sincerely,
Waruno Mahdi

Thank you for your elaborate coverage of the scandalous developments in East Timor. The tragedy of this valiant small island nation has one more aspect, an extremely significant one, which has remained mostly unnoticed so far.

Throughout the 24 years of stiff resistance against Indonesian occupation, the guerilla at home and the movement in exile never resorted to the kind of terror known from other resistance movements. Inspite of weapon deliveries and training for the Indonesian military from leading western democracies, East Timorese freedom fighters never resorted to bombings, hijacking of planes or ships, or other acts of terror against citizens of those democracies or any other countries, or against their property.

The failure of the world community to protect the East Timorese from reprisals for their trust and abidance to civilized rules of conduct could have fatal consequences beyond the tragic deaths and destruction on the island. All propounders of terrorism around the world could now point to East Timor as example, that "it doesn't pay" to abide by the rules!

There is only one way to stop this, and that is to make sure that all the persons responsible for the carnage meet swift and inexorable justice. This is too serious to allow for pragmatic protection of persons in high position or other political hanky-panky to let the chief responsible off the hook. How could one otherwise look relatives of victims of the next "Lockerby" in the eyes?

You may be surprised, that an Indonesian like myself should write this. But it is actually quite simple: the reprisals against the East Timorese has also strengthened the position of the army inside Indonesia, where they maintained a 34-year authoritarian regime only recently being dismantled. Failure to punish the officers responsible for the Timorese tragedy would also put prospects of re-establishment of democracy in Indonesia, and alleviation of the current economic crisis in our country, in grave danger.

Sincerely,
Waruno Mahdi