Asia Times: Suharto's prisoners free, but still fired up


	March 31, 2000	atimes.com

Southeast Asia

Suharto's prisoners free, but still fired up
By Richel Dursin

JAKARTA - They are revelling in their freedom, but some activists who were imprisoned during the time of President Suharto are not taking things easy. Indeed, they foresee much hard work ahead, and say that while the present administration of President Abdurrahman Wahid is an improvement from that of Suharto, it is still not doing enough.

''The era of Suharto is still present,'' says Sri Bintang Pamungkas, a former member of parliament who was a political prisoner during the Suharto regime. ''So it is still a long way to go for democracy, and in this case I have to fight again.''

For his part, Budiman Sudjatmiko, chair of the People's Democratic Party and also an ex-detainee, says: ''In the political context, there is progress. But in the economic sphere, Gus Dur [Wahid] has failed to fulfill his task to run the economy well and very soon the government will cut the subsidies for electricity and fuel and give people the burden.'' He predicts: ''In the long run, this will create social unrest.''

Leading activists like Budiman and Sri Bintang have thus been busy rebuilding their organizations while lobbying the government to speed up political and economic reform.

Wahid's government has been in power only since last October. It also inherited an economy that was in great distress and a society suffering from escalating racial and religious tensions. But people's expectations of the Wahid administration had been high, largely because it happened to be the first in more than three decades to come to power through free elections. Activists had also wanted to see in place as soon as possible the so-called ''seven pillars of reform'' which form the political platform of Sri Bintang's Indonesian Democratic Union.

According to these ''pillars'', both the president and vice-president should be elected directly by the people, Indonesia should be a unitary state with the regions having full autonomy, and the People's Consultative Assembly (MPR) should be restructured since its members do not represent the sovereignty of the people. They also emphasize that the military's dual function should end, judiciary institutions should be independent, and that the country's human rights articles be put in the 1945 constitution that is still in effect.

But Sri Bintang says little is being done to implement real reform. He also claims: ''Gus Dur has no history to fight against the New Order [of Suharto]. He has no vision about reformation so we chose the wrong guy. Now it has been proven that Gus Dur is not consistent in his statements. We don't want to have that kind of guy as president.''

Maybe Indonesian activists are just too impatient. Wahid, it seems, is slowly but surely laying down the groundwork for enduring political reform.

On Monday, he said his government would propose direct elections for the posts of president and vice-president when the country goes to the polls in 2004. ''In that way, we show our respect to . . . the people who are of the opinion that the political system has deviated from the people's will,'' he said in a speech. Wahid and Vice-President Megawati Sukarnoputri were elected by the MPR, Indonesia's highest legislative body, and not through direct public vote.

One of the Wahid administration's earliest acts was to free all political prisoners languishing in jails throughout the country. These prisoners included activists involved in separatist movements in West Papua, Aceh and East Timor.

Suharto's successor, B J Habibie, however, had also released some political detainees. Among those released during his short but turbulent 17 months in office were leading labor advocate Mochtar Pakpahan, East Timorese rebel leader Jose ''Xanana'' Gusmao and Sri Bintang. In May 1996, Sri Bintang was sentenced to two years and 10 months imprisonment after being found guilty of ''insulting'' Suharto. The court said he had referred to the Indonesian strongman as a ''dictator'' during a 1995 seminar at the Technical University of Berlin. Sri Bintang denies this.

Sri Bintang says he doubts whether corruption cases against Suharto will succeed. ''The judiciary mafia [of dishonest police, lawyers and judges] is still there,'' he says. ''So how can we bring Suharto to court? Even if Marzuki Darusman is the attorney general, no way. Marzuki himself is the deputy chair of Golkar, Suharto's political vehicle. So this investigation against Suharto is only a political joke.''

Still, he acknowledges that at least people can now speak freely against the government without being arrested or beaten up, unlike during the Suharto regime.

Budiman, who in 1997 was sentenced to 13 years imprisonment for subversion but was freed along with 90 other political prisoners last December, agrees: ''Now you can criticize the president. Now you can make a big demonstration. This is a good development under the Wahid government.'' But like Sri Bintang, Budiman believes the present administration could do much more, especially in solving the country's economic problems.

Dita Indah Sari, a labor activist who was thrown in jail for leading one of the biggest demonstrations against Suharto, echoes Budiman's concerns for Indonesia's faltering economy and the government's supposedly anemic approach to fixing it.

Sari, now the chair of the National Front for Indonesian Labor Struggles, observes, ''The economic programs of Gus Dur, such as liberalization of the economy, privatization and the cutting of subsidies for electricity and fuel do not give benefits to the people, especially to the working class.'' For instance, she says, Jakarta's recent decision to privatize eight state companies will mean thousands of workers will lose their jobs. The move is meant to raise eight trillion rupiah ($1.1 billion) to help finance the deficit in the April to December state budget.

The government has also agreed with the International Monetary Fund to progressively lift subsidies on electricity and fuel in the 2000 budget year. ''This government is not independent,'' says Sari. ''It is under the domination of imperialist countries like the United States, Japan and the United Kingdom, which represent themselves in the IMF and the World Bank.''

Meanwhile, Sri Bintang says Wahid may not last two years in his seat. He predicts that either the president will give in to his poor health or he will be ousted by groups opposed to him.

As Sri Bintang sees it, there are at least five major groups who do not like Wahid and want to see him go. These include Golkar, the military, the reform movement that has students as core members, the Islamic parties and the Indonesian Democratic Party-Struggle (PDI-P) of Megawati.

He explains that the Islamic parties have been largely neglected by Wahid while the PDI-P believes Megawati should be president since her party got the most number of votes in the June elections.

(Inter Press Service)

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