---------------------------------------------------------- FREE for JOIN Indonesia Daily News Online via EMAIL: go to: http://www.indo-news.com/subscribe.html - FREE - FREE - FREE - FREE - FREE - FREE - Dengan mengClick banner sponsor anda menyumbang Rp. 1000,- untuk HomePage IndoNews. ---------------------------------------------------------- * Leading writer rues his bleak house prospects * Students vow to resume rallies after Idul Fitri * Controversial minister breaks ranks with ruling party * Teachers in "shirts-off" break from ruling party -------------------------------------------------------------- Leading writer rues his bleak house prospects ============================================= South China Morning Post - January 12, 1999 Vaudine England, Jakarta -- The nation's greatest living writer, imprisoned by former president Suharto, is trying to reclaim the house taken from him 33 years ago. So far, he is having little luck. "It feels like just more spite and revenge against me," said Pramoedya Ananta Toer from the house in which he has spent years under house arrest. When Pramoedya was arrested following an alleged communist coup attempt in 1965, the military at the time simply annexed the home where he and his wife had lived for six years. Throughout Pramoedya's harsh 14-year imprisonment on remote Buru Island, his wife Maemunah Ananta Toer moved her home from relative to relative. Stubbornly, she kept her house ownership papers safe. Years passed, during which the much-acclaimed novels now known as the Buru Quartet were published abroad and talk began about when the writer would win the Nobel Prize for Literature. His writing is impassioned, on themes of nationhood, colonialism and repression -- enough to be branded a communist by the Suharto regime. Pramoedya was also a member of a leftist cultural group in the mid-1960s called Lekra, and some other writers still resent the power he wielded then. The Suharto government that had him imprisoned also banned all of his major works and forbade him any public life. Unsurprisingly, it also refused to receive Pramoedya's claim to his former home. But following the fall of Mr Suharto last May, Pramoedya and his legal adviser hoped a more positive verdict could be reached. President Bacharuddin Habibie had promised openness and the call on the streets was for "reformasi". However, the Pramoedya case was last month again rejected -- apparently on procedural grounds. The court suggested the claim for Pramoedya's house should be directed towards the retired military figure who first occupied the house, the Ministry of Defence and the Jakarta military commander. "So far," lawyer Rustam Arozal lamented, "the actual problem of the house itself has not been examined". The writer's case was not unique, he said. Several other past activists had also yet to reclaim their properties. Students vow to resume rallies after Idul Fitri =============================================== Jakarta Post - January 12, 1999 Jakarta -- Student movement groups have vowed to take to the streets of the capital again shortly after the Idul Fitri holidays to voice their strong objections to this year's planned general election, their leaders said Monday. During the rallies, the groups also intend to continue restating their irrevocable demands particularly regarding the trial of former president Soeharto, the establishment of a transitional government, an end to the Armed Forces' dual function and the resignation of President B.J. Habibie. Speaking in a media conference, the student leaders, representing at least nine major student organizations, jointly pledged that they would only stop raising their demands on the streets when a "New Indonesia" is established. The meeting at the Indonesian Christian University (UKI) in Cawang, East Jakarta, was attended by leaders of -- among other groups -- the Big Family of the University of Indonesia (KBUI), the Jakarta Front, the Communication Forum of Jakarta Student Senates (FKSMJ) the City Forum (Forkot), the Independent Front of Gunadarma University Students (FIMA), the Collective Forum (Forbes) the Committee of Students and People for Democracy (Komrad) and the Students and People Forum (Fomara). The representatives grouped themselves together as the Committee of United Students (KMB). "Essentially, we are demanding a new government and a new system," Mohammad Sofyan alias Ian from the Committee of Students and People for Democracy told the media briefing. The students planned also to encourage the general public to join their street protests. "We don't have money. We don't even have media to draw public attention to our demands. So our choice of action is to take to the streets," City Forum spokesman Eli Salomo said. According to the student leaders, they wanted Habibie to step down to give way to a transitional government which would take his place and prepare for a credible general election. They said they strongly rejected the scheduled general election in June this year as they believed that it would not be carried out freely and fairly. "The main problem is that the current government and legislators were elected under defective laws. How can we expect them to hold a free and honest election?" asked Indra Parindrianto of the Jakarta Students Senate. His colleague Eli added: "We don't believe the current government and legislators can alter their behavior and become more democratic in the space of only a few months. So, we believe that the election will not bring about a democratic government as it's organized by people from the former regime." Therefore, the student leaders said they would collaborate with the ordinary people in order to pursue their hopes of a New Indonesia. To reach this objective the students said they had organized "political education ' courses for the general public. particularly the common people, on general politics and the country's current political issues. "We don't agitate people. We want them to have political awareness," said Ian, a student from the Institute of Social and Political Sciences (IISIP). "The people for instance would likely form their own mass organization in which they could exercise their own authority. It was of course impossible to have such an organization under the former regime," he added. But the courses, the students said, would not prevent or seek to deter participants from voting in the upcoming general election. "We want the people to exercise their rights, including the right to vote. Either they want to participate in the election or they want to reject it, but there would not be any force from us," said Eli, a student of the National Institute of Science and Technology (ISTN). To begin with some student groups have already initiated social research in the residential areas neighboring their campuses. Suma Mihardja from KB-UI stated that his group had set up a body called the Salemba People's Committee (KRS) which consisted mostly of youngsters living near their campus at Salemba Central Jakarta. "We discuss with these people and give them lectures on politics. We teach them to analyze the current political situation and explain to them the political maneuvers used by the government and the reasons why we keep on protesting. We hope they can pass on their knowledge to others," he said. Controversial minister breaks ranks with ruling party ===================================================== Agence France Presse - January 13, 1999 Jakarta -- A controversial Indonesian minister has broken ranks with the ruling Golkar party ahead of general elections in June, raising speculation he has his own political ambitions, sources and reports said Wednesday. Adi Sasono, minister of cooperatives and small and medium sized enterprises, told newspapers and television he had declared himself a "non-active member" of Golkar after refusing to campaign for the party in the June polls. Sasono, best known for his advocacy of a "people's economy" to replace the conglomerate-driven years of the Suharto regime, also denied he was forming a new political party to branch out of his own. "Where is the logic? I don't even campaign, how am I going to build a party. So the request to be a non-active member (from Golkar) is really because I have to concentrate in the people's interests," Sasono was quoted by the Media Indonesia daily as saying. Sasono claimed Suharto's successor, President B.J. Habibie, understood his decision to be a non-active member of the party and concentrate on his ministerial duties. But the Panji weekly magazine said Sasono was believed to have sponsored the creation of the new People's Sovereignty Party (PDR) which aimed at targetting supporters from the underprivileged he champions. Nasir Tamara, a member of the Indonesian Moslem Scholars Association (ICMI) which Sasono used to chair, viewed Sasono's resignation as an active Golkar member as a "preparatory step" for him to enter a political party. Nasir said Sasono was testing the political waters by circulating reports of a party under his leadership, and was awaiting the public's response. "In Indonesian political culture, as in every political culture, anyone who wants to create a political party should test the waters," Nasir added. He said Sasono's decision to distance himself from Golkar was part of an effort "to keep his hands free so he could do whatever he wants." "But if Adi Sasono decides to run, I find him to be a more than qualified person as a political leader," Nasir said, adding he believed the new party would easily garner at least 15 percent of the votes in the next election in June. "He would get the support of people who are dissatisfied with the Moslem and other nationalist parties." Following the resignation of former president Suharto in May, 1998, Habibie lifted a Suharto-era ban on political parties other than three officially recognisd by the administration, leading to a rush to form new parties. But the some 120 parties which have mushroomed since then are now awaiting legalization and rulings by parliament on requirements for them to qualify to run in the polls. Teachers in "shirts-off" break from ruling party ================================================ Agence France Presse - January 13, 1999 Jakarta -- A professor at the state-run University of Indonesia (UI) Wednesday took off his blue government-issue shirt at a campus here to symbolize the teaching staff's break from the ruling Golkar party. "We have agreed that civil servants must be neutral. If we should involve in a political party, we'd rather have our own political party," said dentistry professor Roi Pralestya Budi. It was the first time since the fall of former president Suharto in May that any group had rejected the KORPRI (corps of Indonesian civil servants') uniform, which during the Suharto years symbolized their support for Golkar. Budi said he was acting on behalf of some 50 members of the UI teaching staff and those of the neighboring state-run Cipto Mangunkusumo hospital in a ceremony in front of the main building of the university's school of medicine. The shirts, worn on ceremonial occasions, would be donated to the poor, he said. The professor told journalists that the country's some six million civil servants, and their families, must now be independent of any political parties in serving the people. "You can imagine how many votes Golkar gets every election if every family (with an average of five members) votes for it," he added. He said he expected other civil servants to follow suit. The student-backed KORPRI-shirts-off campaign has collected 50 shirts from the staffs of the university and hospital, including that of former university rector Dr. M.K. Tajuddin, Budi said. During the rule of former president Suharto, who stepped down in May last year, civil servants and their family members were obliged to vote for Golkar, helping the party to a landslide victory in every general election. The government of Suharto's successor, President B.J. Habibie, has said the military and civil servants can now be politically neutral, saying they should concentrate on their duty to serve the people. However, Golkar, fearing that it will lose many of its traditional votes, is fighting in parliament for civil servants be allowed to join political parties, claiming that barring them would deprive civil servants of their civil rights. The battle this week reached the top levels of government, with State Secretary Akbar Tanjung, who is also Golkar chairman, in a stand-off with Cooperatives Minister Adi Sasono, who has refused to campaign for Golkar for the upcoming June 7 elections, despite Tanjung's orders to do so. ********************************************************** Action in Solidarity with Indonesia and East Timor (ASIET) PO Box 458, Broadway NSW 2007 Australia Phone: 61-(0)2-96901230 Fax : 61-(0)2-96901381 Email: [EMAIL PROTECTED] WWW : http://www.peg.apc.org/~asiet/ Free Xanana Gusmao, Budiman Sujatmiko and Dita Sari! Free all political prisoners in Indonesia and East Timor! ********************************************************** ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ Didistribusikan tgl. 14 Jan 1999 jam 11:06:37 GMT+1 oleh: Indonesia Daily News Online <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> http://www.Indo-News.com/ ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
