Home > South-East Asia >> Indoleft

Collective sin sticks for life…

Kompas - August 7, 2003

MPRS Decree Number XXV/1966 on the Dissolution of the Indonesian Communist Party and Prohibitions on Marxist, Leninist and Communist Teachings is still being maintained as law. However for the families who have been affected by this “collective sin” as a result of this decree, the issue is not one of the decree being revoked or not(1). The problem is the discrimination that they have to endure.

“We are pessimistic that the government is serious about revoking the MPRS decree which has put us in the position of the victims and [those who have been] sacrificed. It’s all empty talk and I am not truly convinced there is any seriousness there”, said Maryono (50) at his home which is also his place of work in Surabaya, East Java, on Monday (4/8). In order to support his family, he opened a small salon because his efforts to become a state civil servant were blocked by the stigma of black family.

Maryono is the fifth child of seven. His farther, the late Mustaji who was declared to have been involved in the Indonesian Communist Party (PKI), was arrested, tortured and jailed for 12 years without any kind of legal process. Mustaji, who in the last years [of his sentence] was held in the Nusakambangan jail and released in 1978, was an employee with the Locomotive Division and a member of the Indonesian National Army with the rank of sergeant first-class.

“Our lives as a family were totally destroyed because of it”, said Maryono emotionally. They were ostracized. They could only hope that obscure history of the 1965 affair(2) would be set straight and reexamined. When asked to related the experiences of his family who were ostracized by society, Maryono was not that interested. “Everyone knows about us and how our family was discarded and ostracized. We have forgiven them already, because they didn’t know any better”, he said calmly.

He also related some the economic difficulties which directly befell his family after the arrest of his father. As well as this, his and his six siblings’ efforts to become civil servants were blocked because their identity cars were given an “ET” [ex-tapol, ex-political prisoner] stamp. “We have never been able to obtain a statement of cleanliness(3) or the phrase Sampul D [D Seal]”, he recalled.

These discriminatory actions caused all of the members of his family to then go their different ways seeking a means to survive. In the midst of these unimaginable difficulties, their family often received threats from particular parties, such as the military or police. “The threats began to abate in the 1990s. But we are still hunted by fear”, he explained.

The general chairperson of the Central Leadership Committee of the Struggle Institute for the Rehabilitation of Victims of the New Order Regime (Lembaga Perjuangan Rehabilitasi Korban Rezim Orde Baru, LPR-KROB), Sumaun Utomo, is of the view that the MPRS decree represents a stain on the history of the Indonesian nation. “This MPR decree has given rise to a number of regulations and legal instruments which have caused families who had previously been involved with the PKI to be treated in a discriminative manner”, said Suamaun who is now 80 years of age.

Sumaun said that although he was released from Buru Island(4) at the end of 1997, he has never felt truly safe. “It was just like leaving a ‘small jail’ and entering a ‘big jail”, he said.

The MPRS decree has resulted in a number of regulations being issued which according to Sumaun are really strange. “Even the family of prisoners had to experience limitations, moreover at two levels, that is two above, two below and two to the side [meaning it affected the parents, the grandparents, the children and the grand children and family members related by marriage of ex-tapols – JB]. This kind of thing doesn’t happen anywhere else [in the world]”, said Sumaun.

There are various limitations which are applied to prisoners and their families including not being allowed to write, not being allowed to present public talks, not being allowed to teach, not being allowed to be politically active, not being allowed to work as a lawyer, not being allowed to become a civil servant and not being able to hold social events.

As a result of these kind of regulations, Sumaun’s first child was not accepted as a civil servant. This was despite the fact that Sumaun’s first child fulfilled the qualifications to become the headmaster of a technical school in Gombong, Central Java.

An ex-tapol in Central Java, according to Sumaun, was not even allowed to hold a wedding party for their child because they were an ex-tapol.

Up until this day Sumaun, still experiences discrimination. For example in efforts to obtain an ID card, although he is already 80 year of age, Sumaun is still not allowed to hold a life long ID card. This is despite the fact that according to regulations, citizens who are 60 years of age may hold an ID card for life. Truly, this stigma sticks to people for their entire life… (INU/ATO)

Notes

1. One of the agenda items of the annual session of the People’s Consultative Assembly held between August 1-7 was to discuss revoking a number of dated laws and regulations including MPRS Decree XXV/1966. Although the proposal to revoke the decree was originally put forward by the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle, the party of President Megawati Sukarnoputri, it was later withdrawn clearing the way for the decree to remain in force.

2. 1965 affair – an alleged coup attempt in 1965 which the New Order regime of former President Suharto blamed on the PKI.

3. From the 1970s to the early 1990s, a special screening (Litsus) was used to weed out communists in the bureaucracy, military, politics, education, journalism and other “strategic” professions. An offshoot of Litsus was “Bersih Lingkungan” (clean environment), a phrase to denote a person as “pure” from any possible communist influence.

4. Buru Island, near Ambon, was used as a prison camp where thousands of political prisoners were held for decades by the New Order regime of former President Suharto. Prisoners were encouraged to grow crops and take part in sports and participate in activities designed to change the way alleged dissidents thought.

[Translated by James Balowski.]