Ian Wilson

Marjinal performs to a huge crowd at the Hellprint music festival in Bandung. Ian Wilson

Marjinal and Taring Babi (‘Pigs tusk’) are a punk band and punk arts collective based in Srengsengsawah on the outskirts of Jakarta. Formed in 1997, for the past 15 years they have created a uniquely Indonesian brand of punk, combining music, art and activism. Building a large and enthusiastic following and networks of like-minded punks, Marjinal have stayed committed to the punk ethic of ‘Do It Yourself’, avoiding the traps and temptations of commercialism and encouraging others to create and distribute their own music and art through free ukulele, silk-screening and woodcut workshops.

In recent times, and particularly since the much publicised arrests and forced ‘re-education’ of 65 punks in Banda Aceh in December 2011 Marjinal have made frequent appearances in the Indonesian print media and television, even playing shows at Islamic boarding schools, or pesantren, in an attempt to counter some of the prevailing negative stereotypes about punks.

The Banda Aceh incident was just one case of many throughout the past 18 months in which local governments have targeted punks. Since February 2011 there have been repeated ‘anti-punk’ raids in at least 40 cities and towns spread throughout the country, including Jakarta, with hundreds if not thousands of punks detained and subject to various forms of humiliation and ‘re-education’. The rationale given by local politicians has been that punks are a criminal nuisance, an eyesore or are ‘in conflict with Indonesian cultures and values’. In April 2012, Marjinal members along with a number of other Jakarta punks and myself met with officials from the National Department of Social Affairs to lobby against this criminalisation of punk identity. While showing some sympathy, officials said that their ‘hands were tied’ when it came to altering local government policy.

Despite official harassment, or perhaps due to it, punk continues to grow in popularity in Indonesia, in particular amongst poor urban youth. Often identified in the West with a more commercial style, in Indonesia the sub-genre of ‘street punk’ is the preserve of street kids, buskers and poor kampung youth. In what is often a harsh and unforgiving world, Marjinal’s music, art and ideas are a source of inspiration for many of these street punks, and their open communal house in Srengsengsawah is a hive of activity, as well as a place of solidarity and support. On any given day punks from throughout Indonesia can be found there, along with visitors from Japan, Malaysia, Australia, Europe and the US.

Frequently touring throughout Indonesia, Ian Wilson joined Marjinal and Taring Babi on a recent road trip from Jakarta to Sukabumi, Bandung and Yogyakarta.

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Ian Wilson (iwilson@murdoch.edu.au) is a Research Fellow at the Asia Research Centre and lecturer in Social Sciences and Humanities at Murdoch University, Western Australia. Marjinal can be contacted at dosakoe@gmail.com or via their website: http://kaum-marjinal.com/

Gde Putra

Taman 65 works to ease tensions in Balinese society through study and discussion Gde Putra

The southern hall of Made’s family compound is usually filled with women making offerings while they gossip over their favourite soap operas and their never-ending struggles with debt. Today, however, the atmosphere is different. The hall is full of men, and there is tension and hostility in the air. A meeting has been called to try to resolve ongoing conflict over a contested plot of land. Made’s family claims that the land is rightfully theirs, but the certificate of ownership is in the hands of Made’s uncle, a respected elder known for his active membership of the village association (banjar) and his contributions to the temple. At issue is the status of a plot of land that once belonged to Made’s parents. His family accuses his uncle of having stolen the land after the bloody conflict that tore through Balinese communities in late 1965.

According to Made’s family, without permission or blessing from Made’s father, his uncle changed the name on the certificate of land ownership his father had recently inherited from his parents, claiming that he – not Made’s father – was the family member most worthy of inheriting the land. It was easy for him to do this without Made’s father’s knowledge, since his father had been taken into custody as a sympathiser of the Indonesian Communist Party, and was being held in prison at the time. Ever since then, Made’s family has had to stand by and watch his uncle’s family ride out times of financial hardship with the money they earn from renting out the land. For them, the tragedy of 1965 is an ongoing cause of resentment and misery.

Maintaining tradition

Made’s family’s experience is not unique in present-day Bali. The tragedy of 1965 not only divided communities, it also created latent warfare between relatives living under one roof, sharing a family temple, and belonging to the same banjar. These tensions often lie buried, because social pressures demand that families live harmoniously. With their common ancestral lineage, different branches of the same family have obligations to the same family temple, so each time there is a family gathering associated with the performance of traditional ceremonies, any underlying tensions between family members have to be repressed. The cultural practices and rituals associated with family temples are entrenched by the state as ways of fortifying tradition and its role in the tourist industry. Under these circumstances, people who may be harbouring vengeful feelings towards one another will be brought together time and again, because they always need to work together on ritual occasions.

Traditional Balinese ceremonies that mark the cycles of human life, such as the celebration of a baby’s third month of life, teeth filing, marriage or cremations, always involve whole families. They cannot be avoided, because they are part and parcel of being a ‘normal’ Balinese Hindu, and they touch on the most personal and intimate of spheres of an individual’s life. In social spheres as well, it is risky for a Balinese to go against norms and cultural expectations. To do so would invite gossip, or even lead to anger being directed at a person’s loved ones, like a grandmother, grandfather or parents. Anyone who ignores social responsibilities suffers feelings of guilt, because to the rest of the community it seems as though they do not respect the dedication of their loved ones in maintaining traditional obligations. Socially, they are perceived as uncaring and arrogant, because their actions suggest that they think they can live independently, and survive without the blessings of their ancestors.

Observance of the rituals associated with family temples in Bali is also important for a person’s sense of security. The temple is the backbone of people’s hopes and dreams, making them feel safe and comfortable when the wider world betrays their sense of trust. In this context, any dark corners in family history continue to be suppressed. Hostilities do not disappear, but they are not expressed directly. Made’s family senses his uncle’s aloofness and poor manners when the families come together to clean the temple compound, but the conflict is always kept on hold so it does not have an impact on ceremonies or get in the way of receiving the blessings and thanks of the gods of the family temple. To an outsider, the level of suppression is practically unimaginable, considering the frequency of temple ceremonies and the tendency for the warring parties to live together in the same family compound.

State reinforcement and individual caution

Forces that suppress conflict are strengthened by issues that have had a devastating impact on contemporary Bali, such as terrorism and natural disasters. Responses to these issues often take the form of ceremonies to clean and purify Bali from evil spirits that threaten the safety and wellbeing of human kind. This ongoing parade of state-sponsored rituals is aimed at strengthening the belief in the minds of the people that Bali is safe because the Creator protects it, in response to the myriad ceremonies and continuous prayers of its citizens. In this situation, the circumstances that encourage the repression of conflict, rather than its resolution, are continually reinforced.

In Bali, the ritualisation of worldly problems detracts from belief in individual strength and discourages Balinese people from straying from the pack. It also serves to silence those voices wanting to reveal the ugly side of the nation’s past. The scars of past conflicts never appear on the surface, and the ghosts of family histories only appear in gossip and rumours. Witnesses to that dark history only tell their stories with great caution. They are riddled with internal conflict because they know that their testimonies would threaten the solidarity that is fundamental to the ceremonies of Balinese people. Opening up the past could stand in the way of their family’s receiving the Creator’s blessings.

Philosophical underpinning

Balinese culture is not lacking in a philosophical underpinning for the avoidance of conflict. The philosophy of karma phala, or ‘fruits of past actions’, is a trusted way of coping with histories of conflict between people who are obliged to meet face-to-face in the performance of traditional obligations. It became part of a powerful discourse in post-1965 Bali, where the state did not defend the interests of those who lost relatives, and people were discouraged from holding the nation to account for the disappearance of their loved ones. Karma phala reassures those who follow its law that justice will be upheld and sinners cannot escape the due punishment that will come to them in time. The oppressed and weak have faith in this philosophy, and find solace in the knowledge that someday, the oppressors will get their just deserts. Families of victims of the 1965 tragedy have their belief in karma phala confirmed when they see misfortune befall the butchers of that time of savagery.

Karma phala gives hope to those who are powerless because it assures them that time is not blind. Though it may be too risky for them to fight the powerful, they do not completely surrender. They are able to maintain their desire for revenge in the hope that time will eventually bring fairness. Conversely, it can be argued that karma phala has protected the oppressors, because it deflects any attempt to hold them accountable, or denounce or destroy their power. Yet the universal belief karma phala attracts from Balinese people means that the philosophy also has an impact on society’s powerful. They too have to live with the knowledge that their sins will one day catch up with them and they will need to find redemption. Many people believe that the donations made for ceremonies by powerful people is a form of ritual contrition, rather than an expression of gratitude for blessings they have already received.

Belief in karma phala enables Balinese people to suppress feelings of anger and the need for revenge. It helps those who harbour these feelings to appear as though nothing is wrong when they come together for a wedding, cremation or tooth filing ceremony. It is also one source of the profits government and private investors draw from the image of the Balinese as good, friendly people who value community solidarity in an age when people living in the modern world are seen as individualistic and selfish. Cultural tourism is a gold mine for land owners and investors, so it’s no wonder the tourist industry would like to see the dark sides of domestic history erased from the collective memory of the Balinese people. Optimistic slogans that encourage people to forget these memories, like ‘Continue going forward with optimism, don’t look back’, are not only promoted by the greedy and powerful people at the ‘top’, but also by the people living at the ‘bottom’ of Balinese society.

From the perspective of modern-day Bali, it is hard to believe that tragedies as terrible as those of 1965 actually took place. But the tensions those tragedies have bequeathed are never far from the surface, and there is always the possibility that vengeful feelings could one day explode. Made’s family appears ready to take the risk of confronting their feelings of injustice, but when it comes to the crunch, some of them are unwilling to disturb the appearance of family harmony. Why risk alienating an uncle who regularly lends them his car when a family member falls ill and needs medical care, or who is known to be one of the most generous donors for ceremonies at the family temple? In Bali, it is risky to express what one truly feels. It is almost as though one has to wait to go insane, or go into a trance before expressing oneself honestly. Stories of the tragedy of 1965 in Bali remain in the dark, partly because revealing them could lead to a battle amongst relatives that might ultimately be of benefit to no-one. But the suppression of conflict cannot last forever, and a question still remains. What will happen if one day karma phala is no longer enough to contain the anger of those victims of past events?

Gde Putra is a member of the Taman 65 community, a group of individuals focused on the study of the1965 tragedy and its implications for contemporary society.{jcomments on}

Ahmad Muhajir

No sleeping in the mosque Ahmad Muhajir

Most days, after the congregation of Az-Zawiyah mosque in southern Jakarta finish their noon prayer, there is a familiar scene. Most of the worshippers, who work in nearby construction sites, rush to food stalls to appease their hunger. Only a small number of people sit devotedly for any length of time, concentrating on their devotions.

During the Islamic fasting month, the situation is different. Almost all participants in the prayer session stay on for a while, spending some time on a worldly pleasure in the house of God: taking a nap. This practice is observable in many prayer houses during the holy month of Ramadan, when Muslims are taught to resist worldly temptations. But the fact that it is tolerated reveals religious leniency and, to some extent, sympathy for fasting Muslims.

Ramadan and new habits

The daily life of the average Indonesian Muslim changes several ways during the fasting month. Sleeping hours are modified to accommodate an early breakfast (sahur) at a time when people are usually in deep sleep before dawn. Muslims consume no foods or drinks throughout the day until sunset, although one can still find discreet food stalls and restaurants which continue to serve customers. Additional night prayers, special for Ramadan, the tarawih, are observed in congregation, increasing attendance at mosques but reducing the resting time of Muslims.

People’s exposure to religious teachings also intensifies because there are all but constant Islamic sermons available in both prayer houses and the media. One consequence is that during the month people make more donations to religious causes and ritual observation generally rises. Despite such changes, people still work as usual and the wheels of the economy do not slow down.

During Ramadan, when working Muslims still have their lunch breaks but do not eat because they fast, many go to prayer houses. This reflects the increased piety of the month. But it also has a more prosaic explanation: people need to find a place to use their break time wisely. It is not surprising therefore that the scene inside mosques changes rather dramatically following the end of daytime prayer sessions, from one with people bowing, touching their foreheads to the floor in prayer, to one with people lying on their backs deep in slumber. This activity is popular especially among men.

Most working Muslim women do not share the habit of taking naps in mosques. Only very few of them stay on to sleep in the area reserved for female worshippers, indicated by a partition. The partitions are commonly made of fabric or board, and serve as a wall that blocks visibility from the other side. Hidden behind such walls are the women who take the opportunity to lie down for a rest after prayers. But many women simply feel that the partitions are not large enough, or too flimsy, to give them the comfort and privacy they need to be able to sleep. And because the space provided for female worshippers is typically much smaller than that for males, women feel that they have to give way for women who are coming in to pray, rather than taking up space by sleeping.

Relaxing in prayer houses

For men, however, prayer houses have long served in Indonesian Islam not only as the places of worship but also as places for taking a rest. They are typically spacious and their floors are regularly cleaned. The temperature in mosques and other prayer houses is also usually pleasant, thanks to the high ceilings and the natural or mechanical wind that blows from outside or from fans and air conditioners. Add thick carpets, and they offer a free and comfortable space to lie down and relax for a short while after prayers.

In the small mosque of Az-Zawiyah around three dozen workers would took a nap of 30 minutes to an hour during their lunch break on Ramadan days. In the national Islamic prayer house, the Grand Mosque of Istiqlal, hundreds of visitors would lie down on the carpeted floor in the afternoon while waiting to break their fast.

Likewise, travellers who are heading back to their hometowns as they take part in the great annual migration that occurs toward the end of Ramadan every year in Indonesia, particularly those in private vehicles, find big mosques good stopping places along the way. The great mosque in Tapin district in South Kalimantan, for instance, experiences a tremendous flow of visitors as people stop by on their trips to and from Banjarmasin. A security officer in Al-Azhar mosque in Bekasi, West Java says that the number of travellers who transit in his workplace might top one thousand every day during the migration (mudik) period.

Such visitors typically use the mosque restrooms and then take ablutions, do their prayers and afterwards, close their sleepy eyes for a few minutes. After all, having some rest en route is highly recommended to reduce the risk of motor vehicle accidents. While adults do such things, the small children travelling with them can have fun by running in and around the mosque and enjoying some fresh air before they continue on the long journey to ‘grandpa’s house’. Mosques in this way supplement the petrol stations and restaurants people also stop off at while travelling home for the Id al-Fitr holiday.

Prohibited or permitted?

Not all mosque managers are happy, however, to see people taking a nap. One can often find notes on the wall, the front door or even the pillars of some prayer houses that prohibit the act of sleeping. There are also often instructions to silence cell phones, something that people are more likely to comply with. Some notes are more recommendatory than prohibitive in nature, along the lines of ‘this place should not function as a sleeping room’. Sometimes, though not that commonly, there are even staff who bother to wake up those taking a nap.

More often than not, people ignore such notes and the habit of nap taking in mosques persists, especially during Ramadan. Apparently, there is a basis in Islamic law and tradition for this. In Islamic legal discourse, sleeping in mosques is generally viewed as a permissible act. According to sound hadith (sayings and deeds of the Prophet) some of the first generation of Muslims did it, and more prominently, so did members of a group that was embryonic to the later Sufi community There was a group of people in early Muslim history called ‘ahlus suffah’ who slept in mosques, wore rough clothing and lived humble lives. Later on, this group arguably inspired the ideas of tasawwuf (Sufism) and people who follow their way of life formed the Sufi community.

On the other hand, it is true that some classical scholars did not favor this position and argued instead that sleeping in mosques was a reprehensible act. However, given the hadith and the absence of any explicit prohibition by the Prophet, the legal opinion permitting the act receives wider acceptance. Only in two exceptional circumstances does the law clearly forbid sleeping in mosques. The first is when doing so makes the prayer house dirty, and the second is when the prohibition comes from a person who owns the mosque privately.

Religious leniency

Ramadan is a month when the value of every good deed is multiplied. Islamic preachers urge their fellow Muslims to maximise the efforts to perform their devotions, more so than in other months, and to have religious experiences beyond mere thirst and hunger. Learning to control one’s desires is often cited as being the core lesson to be attained from fasting, and seen from this perspective, taking a nap during the day in Ramadan may seem inappropriate: sleeping, after all, is worldly and inactive.

Viewed in another light, however, during Ramadan even sleeping might be counted as an act that earns religious reward. In an environment where the day is hot and the throat has dried up, when pious Muslims try to avoid the temptation of breaking their fast early – especially if they have witnessed others doing so – mosques provide shelter. Having a nap can help keep you on the straight and narrow. It seem that the keepers of many Indonesian mosques understand this. Accordingly, they leave the sleepers alone in their struggle to survive another day of Ramadan.

Ahmad Muhajir (ajir_82@yahoo.com) teaches at IAIN Antasari Banjarmasin and was a fellow in Indonesian Young Leaders program.

Iip D. Yahya

A Sundanese mini-fiction illustrated by Nazaruddin Azhar Iip Yahya

The message that greets visitors to the ‘Sundanese Mini-Fictions’ website is ‘Let us revitalise our sense of Sunda!’ This slogan is attracting many Sundanese writers to submit contributions for posting on the site. The participation rate is very high: between the time of its launch in September 2011 and May of 2012, the site posted no less than 18,638 stories, read by 2716 members, who had responded with 206,868 comments and 288,103 signs of approval in the form of the ‘thumbs up’ icon. It appears that technology is generating renewed interest in writing and reading Sundanese.

Sundanese mini-fictions

The Sundanese Mini-Fictions website was launched by the writer, broadcaster and journalist Nazaruddin Azhar on 16 September 2011. He was later joined by the writer and IT specialist Dadan Sutisna. Then came Godi Suwarna, a senior writer of prose and poetry in Sundanese. Because of the volume of contributions, two more administrators have recently commenced work. Inspired by the mini-fiction literature revival in Latin America, and following similar initiatives already underway in Indonesia, the site is a contemporary response to the surge of interest in Sundanese language and literature that accompanied the decentralisation policies of the early New Order period.

Many people have been surprised by the interest the site has attracted. Many posters are not just interested in literature, but also the Sundanese language: they use the site to expand their knowledge of their mother tongue, and express their pleasure in learning new expressions and widening their vocabularies. But apart from that, the site is giving expression to a sense of social and political change. The Sundanese language used on the site is moving away from the traditionalism and nostalgia that have encumbered it since independence, and towards a more egalitarian medium in which people participate with feelings of pleasure rather than inhibition.

The mini-fictions project uses the Facebook social networking site. After a mini-fiction is sent to the site, it is subjected to a ‘filtering process’ to ensure that it is a genuine submission. Works considered to be of very low quality are returned to the writer for further development. There are no tight and binding rules about making contributions to the site, except that all postings must be fiction, and stories should be less than 150 words in length. Once a mini-fiction has been posted, readers can send responses. In most cases, these appear minutes after a story is posted, most commonly in the form of a raised thumb indicating approval. If readers find the story interesting, exchanges of comments between members sometimes turn into discussions of linguistic, literary, social, political, and educational issues.

On one hand, the requirement of brevity makes participation attractive for many aspiring writers. Even novices are not scared of revealing too many shortcomings in just one hundred words or so. And the administrators have been surprised at the linguistic wealth of the contributions from writers from all walks of life: Godi and the other managers of the site are constantly meeting Sundanese expressions and lexical items of which they were previously unaware. On the other hand, writing quality fiction of this length is often harder than it sounds. The imaginative skills of the writer are the same as those needed to write short stories or novels, and there is greater pressure to squeeze ideas into expressions that make economical use of language.

There are only two requirements to join the group: competence in Sundanese and the ability to use online social networking media. Many group members use their smartphones to contribute, send responses and give their ‘thumbs-up’ while they go about their everyday lives. This technological component of the project is significant, because it frees the mini-fiction phenomenon from the input of older, established writers who are in general technologically illiterate. Some senior writers are not even familiar with a computer, let alone social networking media. From this perspective, the site may be heralding a ‘silent revolution’ in Sundanese literature. It is as though the senior writers who have constantly dominated Sundanese literary activity have been ‘removed’ from the scene by the intervention of technology.

The mini-fictions site has succeeded because of the complimentary talents of its administrators Dadan Sutisna

Administering change

The three original administrators brought unique skill sets to the group. As a broadcaster and a journalist, Nazaruddin serves as public relations officer, inviting users to join the group. He also acts as the gatekeeper who filters out contributions that are frivolous or of poor quality. He regularly reads mini-fictions from the site to listeners of the radio programs he broadcasts from Tasikmalaya, in the heart of West Java.

Dadan Sutisna brings technical knowhow. His background includes the creation of an award-winning computer program for the use of Sundanese script. He is responsible for the initial publication of mini-fictions on the Facebook group (www.facebook.com/groups/fikminsunda/). After that, he moves them to www.fikminsunda.com, which serves as a documentary repository for the group. On both sites, readers can find statistical data on the number of works written by members, the number of comments given, and so on. Through his technical knowhow, Dadan is mobilising technology that is enabling the creation of a resource for Sundanese writing on a scale never seen before.

The ‘Godi factor’ is also very significant. Godi is a senior writer whose poetry, short stories and novels have earned him three Rancagé awards, the literary prize initiated by the prominent Sundanese writer and cultural commentator Ajip Rosidi. He has long been known as a writer who is interested in crossing generational barriers, and his house in Ciamis, in the southern part of West Java, is always open to junior writers wanting to sit and chat with him about Sundanese literature. He puts his literary sensibility to use by sharing comments and opinions with aspiring writers who contribute to the site. Under Godi’s direction, some members develop ‘specialisations’, writing repeatedly on one particular theme. And being a senior writer, Godi gives the site an important connection to the Sundanese writing establishment.

In response to the participation attracted by the site, other institutions in West Java have climbed on board. The rector of Bandung’s Padjadjaran University, Professor Ganjar Kurnia, has become a member of the group, and a number of his works have been positively received by the site’s followers. He also supported the first ‘mini-fictions congress’ at Padjadjaran University (UNPAD) in Bandung in November 2011. This event included a graphic display and writing competition. Another congress was held on the International Day of Mother Tongues, 21 February 2012.

Conventional media have also joined in. Two local newspapers, Galemedia (Bandung) and Kabar Priangan (Tasikmalaya) regularly publish selected works in their hard-copy editions. A selection of contributions will soon be published in book form, with printing expenses to be met by the mini-fiction contributors.

Technology and taboo

Sundanese literary activity has always tended to be dominated by elites, especially those in control of a small number of magazines. This has brought with it a general conservatism of literary style. Writing in Sundanese tends to project images of polite introverts reluctant to express their deeper emotions as they struggle to navigate social and religious taboos. The mini-fictions group offers something different. In place of polite introverts, it has given voice to those who are anxious to do away with social taboos of all kinds.

One example concerns attitudes to marriage. In the past, male writers have written freely in Sundanese and Indonesian on the theme of polygamy. Now, readers of Sundanese mini-fictions have been exposed to the work of female writers expressing favourable attitudes to polyandry, something that would be difficult to publish in the standard media of newspapers and magazines. For example, a recent mini-fiction by Endah Dinda Jenura brought great approval from group members: the story described a fictional professor presenting new scientific discoveries about the menstrual cycle that would enable women to avoid pregnancy and enjoy polyandry.

Despite the rebellious attitudes the site sometimes gives expression to, the tone of exchanges and comments between members is always polite and inclusive. Exchanges are often critical, but the site displays a high level of respectfulness and friendliness. This ethic of politeness has contributed to the high participation in the site, and so has the absence of the personal differences and rivalries that have long dogged the Sundanese (and Indonesian) literary world. In traditional publishing, reviews and decisions are made behind closed doors, with the author excluded from the process of evaluation. In the Sundanese mini-fictions site, the administrators do exclude work they consider to be of low quality, but they do not assume responsibility for the quality of the works posted. Everything is open to all, and this transparency has contributed to a broad sense of appreciation for the site.

Despite the processes of change represented by the mini-fictions site, some things remain the same: most stories posted on the site deal with the theme of romance. A recent posting entitled ‘The Episode of the Night Flower’ by the senior writer Hadi AKS is illustrative: a divorced man experiences complex internal reflections when he encounters his former spouse working as an entertainer in a nightclub. Fictions of this type, known as ‘pink stories’ by the group’s members, are usually the most enthusiastically received.

Nevertheless, the mini-fictions site is providing a space for expression that displays open-mindedness and social inclusion. It is critical, but it has not lost the sense of fun and humour that are so important for Sundanese audiences. In fact, the humour of the project is enhanced by its technical features: its accessibility enables posters to contribute mini-fictions and comments in their limited free time.

Some contributors see a political potential in the site. In the current Indonesian climate, they are more and more aware that Indonesian political and social life is still dominated by the established players. Political taboos and restraints on communication perpetuate outlooks that are obsolete and exclusive. There is a possibility, some argue, that the mini-fictions phenomenon will be a forum for the expression of alternatives to a status quo with which Sundanese are all too familiar.

Iip D. Yahya (iip_chapter@yahoo.com) is a freelance writer currently undertaking research at Monash University.{jcomments on}

Inside Indonesia 110: Oct-Dec 2012

Marcus Mietzner

Mostly known for his previous writings on Indonesia’s political economy, Jeffrey Winters has produced a significant and insightful book that goes well beyond the boundaries of the Indonesian archipelago. Indeed, to call his work a remarkable piece of comparative political science research would be an understatement. Rather, Winters delivers an all-encompassing account of the role of oligarchs in world history, drawing from examples that date back to Ancient Greece.

An engaging writer and not afraid to make broad (and sometimes sweeping) statements, Winters proposes provocative explanations for the continued material inequality in modern democratic politics. In its expansive scope, Winters’ study succeeds: it highlights one of the least reflected-upon deficiencies of Western democracies, and emphasises how oligarchs (defined as ‘actors who command and control massive concentrations of material resources that can be employed to defend or enhance their personal wealth and exclusive social position’) are able to coexist with the democracies of the 21^st century.

For Winters, there are fundamentally four types of oligarchy: to begin with, warring oligarchies are dominated by armed oligarchs who defend their wealth with the help of private armies. In such a system, oligarchs generally fight one another, leading to high levels of institutional fragmentation. In ruling oligarchies, by contrast, leading oligarchs still compete but they reach a compromise about some form of collective supremacy over the rest of society.

Sultanistic oligarchies, for their part, are presided over by an individual oligarch, who sits at the top of a patronage pyramid and controls the ambitions of all other oligarchs. Importantly, Winters portrays Suharto’s Indonesia as such a sultanistic oligarchy. According to Winters, Suharto’s oligarchic hegemony only crumbled when his children’s expanding business interests posed a direct threat to the property and wealth of other oligarchs.

Finally, civil oligarchies are those that contain the actions of oligarchs through the rule of law. To be sure, the rule of law is also in the interest of oligarchs – it protects their property rights and allows them to dispense with the necessity of defending their wealth through the use of armed militias. Winters’ main examples in this category are the United States and Singapore.

The case of Indonesia

Winters’ comparative and historical reflections are astute, and his description of the New Order as a sultanistic oligarchy is persuasive – despite not being entirely new. Other authors – such as Edward Aspinall – had already applied the concept of sultanism (which is derived from Juan Linz’ and Alfred Stepan’s writings on regime types) to the case of Suharto’s Indonesia, and neo-Marxist scholars around Richard Robison had illuminated the role of the oligarchy in the New Order polity as early as the mid-1980s. Winters has cleverly merged these two approaches, but his discussion of that period does not disclose new material or theoretical interpretations that could dramatically change scholarly accounts of Suharto’s rule. Rather, it is Winters’ classification of the post-Suharto state that is the most novel, but arguably also least sustainable section of the book as far as political analyses of Indonesia are concerned.

In Winters’ typology, post-authoritarian Indonesia is an ‘untamed ruling oligarchy’. According to his analysis, Indonesia’s democratisation allowed the country’s oligarchs to shake off the shackles that Suharto had put on them. Instead of being curtailed by increasing transparency, electoral competitiveness and a myriad of new social forces, Indonesian oligarchs used the absence of a ‘sultan’ to establish control over a political system marked by weak legal institutions. Thus, while Indonesian oligarchs are ‘fully disarmed’, they ‘use their material power resources for wealth and property defence in a political economy overflowing with threats and uncertainties’.

Although it is easy to agree with Winters’ assessment that oligarchs have assumed a strong position in post-Suharto politics, he provides little evidence for his claim that they are in fact ‘ruling’ the polity. Indeed, given that much of the field research for his book was done in Indonesia, Winters’ section on the ‘untamed ruling oligarchy’ in contemporary Indonesia is surprisingly thin – both empirically and analytically.

Sadly, we learn very little about the power constellation in the country’s post-authoritarian politics, and not much is revealed about who the oligarchs are and how exactly they exercise their ‘rule’. Apart from offering a somewhat simplistic dichotomy between Chinese and pribumi (indigenous) oligarchs, Winters provides no map of oligarchic politics in Indonesia’s democracy – something that would have been extraordinarily useful. This absence is compounded by the fact that Winters calls his interviewees ‘Oligarch A’ or ‘Oligarch I’, even if and when they simply confirm trends or patterns already widely reported in the press.

Winters’ fixation on oligarchic rule has two serious implications for his characterisation of post-Suharto Indonesia. First, it leads him to miss the nuances of political contestation in the new, democratic polity. Political parties, Muslim groups, labour unions, NGOs, media organisations, local movements – they are only touched upon insofar they have come under the influence of oligarchic interests as well. And while some of them have indeed been infiltrated in such ways, others haven’t, and others again have witnessed internal struggles between oligarchic and non-oligarchic forces. None of this complexity is conveyed in Winters’ account. There is also very little recognition of the continuing (and, according to some observers, widening) ideological divide between Indonesians who want to maintain the pluralistic foundations of the state and those that aim for a more formal role of Islam in state organisation. Ideology, as a whole, seems to be entirely absent from Winters’ analysis – an omission that is consequential even in the discussion of modern polities in the West, but is particularly visible in a Muslim democracy such as Indonesia’s.

Second, and related to the point above, Winters’ near-universal categories produce very rough and thus often inaccurate characterisations of key politicians and events. For instance, with oligarchs described as Indonesia’s ruling class, Winters succumbs to the temptation of calling almost every prominent political leader an oligarch. Interestingly, he seems rather uncomfortable with such a broad sweep himself, leading him to invent the category of ‘middle oligarch’. But Winters’ main case study in this regard – Akbar Tanjung – is unconvincing. It is true that Akbar, the chairman of Golkar in the early post-Suharto period, is personally wealthy, allowing him to cover some of the costs of his political operations. But far more important for Akbar’s strength in Golkar has been his decades-long involvement with the party’s grassroots, committees and organisational bodies. In turn, this popularity convinced wealthy sponsors to provide Akbar with donations, which further consolidated his position in Golkar. Akbar’s categorisation as a ‘middle oligarch’ therefore brushes over several layers of types of politicians and their complicated interaction. In today’s Indonesia, around half of the chairpersons of political parties belong to the type of well-connected and long-time party activist that Akbar represents – they are neither ‘full’ nor ‘middle’ oligarchs on Winters’ analytical spectrum.

Of course, Winters did not intend to write a detailed book on the Indonesian oligarchy and its role in post-Suharto politics. His ambition was much more far-reaching: to present a study on the almost timeless structures of oligarchic dominance in world history. Therefore, like most other comparative, context-transcending and universalist writings, Winters’ book makes no apologies for sacrificing factual precision on the altar of groundbreaking theory-building. There is no doubt that Winters’ book succeeds in the latter field in an impressive manner: comparativist political scientists and theorists will find his contribution highly stimulating and innovative. The community of Indonesianists, on the other hand, will discover plenty of material in this important book that deserves critical questioning.

Jeffrey A. Winters, Oligarchy, New York: Cambridge University Press, 2011.

Marcus Mietzner (marcus.mietzner@anu.edu.au) is Senior Lecturer, School of Culture, History and Language, College of Asia and the Pacific, Australian National University.

Stefani Haning Swarati

The national flag is the central theme for the campaign launch by phone company Nokia Stefani Haning Swarati

'Beautiful is my country. Beautiful is Indonesia, my pride.' This slogan could have been plucked from any number of state-sponsored campaigns, but in fact it is taken from a recent television commercial advertising a popular brand of energy drink. Such appeals to nationalism are now ubiquitous in commercials screened on Indonesian television stations, with domestic and multinational companies creating ads for fruit drinks, instant noodles, coffee, cigarettes and health supplements referencing the idea of Indonesia as a nation.

The brand Kuku Bima used this particular slogan as an advertisement for its energy drinks, launched in 2009. Like many commercials of this genre, it appears to take inspiration from the national motto, Unity in Diversity, making use of aerial shots showing a natural rock formation in an azure blue sea. Destinations including Papua, North Sumatra, Maluku, Labuan Bajo and Semarang feature in different versions of the commercial. A different ad for the beverage NutriSari opens with a close-up of a boy blowing a conch shell, his body and face colourfully painted, wearing a garb of feathers and shells. It is followed by on-screen text proclaiming this to be ‘the face of Papua’. The sequence continues with shots of dancing adults in similar costumes. Slipped in between these two visions of ‘traditional’ culture is a scene of a man and woman clapping and laughing in ‘modern’ dress. She is wearing sunglasses and a camera hangs from his neck, a not so subtle suggestion that they are tourists watching the dance performance. Similar scenes follow as the ad moves through the cultures of Ambon, Java, Bali and Betawi.

Cigarette companies are also joining in this celebration of Indonesia. One ad for the brand Djarum Super aired in 2011 shows three men setting out to explore the country. Inspired by the travel journal genre, the title of the ad, My Great Adventure Indonesia, appears in English. The adventurers in this ad visit a new location each day, including a jeep ride into the heart of the Sumatran jungle, an elephant tour at Way Kambas and an opportunity to surf the waves at Kuta beach.

A similar sense of exploration is conveyed in a commercial for cigarette brand Gudang Garam. Titled My Home, My Indonesia, it was first aired to commemorate Independence Day in 2006 but continued over subsequent years. The voice-over recounts a tale of discovery: ‘When I see something that I have never seen before my eyes are opened. How beautiful is this country.’ Shots of vintage-era maps are combined with a female model and four children playfully engaging with all the things that nature and culture have to offer. While children might represent what is beautiful about Indonesia, they are a provocative choice of subject for a tobacco company.

Another company that harnesses Indonesia’s diversity is Indomie, a popular brand of instant noodles. In 2009 the brand launched a series of ads depicting various parts of Indonesia, identifiable by their physical landmarks, landscapes and traditional dances. Singers take turns to sing a line from the jingle in regional languages including Manadonese, Ambonese, Balinese, Javanese, as well as in Indonesian. The jingle emphasises ‘our’ diversity in taste, culture and language. Yet there is one thing that ‘we’ all have in common, and this, always voiced in Indonesian, is a taste for Indomie. At the end of the ad, the cast each raise a bowl of noodles as they gather in a field with high-rise buildings in the background. Arguably, this depiction of diversity was so appealing that President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono (SBY) used a similar ad for his 2009 election campaign. The campaign ad featured the same music and similar scenes depicting landscapes and people from the different regions in Indonesia. Only the lyrics of the presidential campaign advertisement were changed to conclude not with ‘Indomie, my taste’ but with ‘SBY, my president’.

The national motto, Unity in Diversity, was used by the New Order as a nation-building strategy in response to the challenges of a large, archipelagic and plural country. As these television commercials suggest, diversity remains a key theme in the construction of Indonesian identity. To varying degrees, the implied power disparity of the New Order period lingers within these ads. The audience are asked to identify with modern, mobile tourists and explorers who come to experience traditional local life and pristine nature. Maps with place names imply that these regions are unfamiliar to the audience. The depiction of ‘local’ children associates locals with purity, innocence and happiness. Notably, Papua appears in the majority of these commercials. Depicting Papuans as people who look and dress differently, Papua appeals as the most distinctive part of Indonesia, and a catchy way for advertisers to substantiate the idea that Indonesia is a country of diversity.

A persistent and persevering nation

While the idea of Indonesia as a country of cultural diversity is the most dominant theme in commercials, they also send a message about perseverance. A host of brands are busy promoting Indonesians, and their own companies, as contributing to the progress of the nation. The Indonesians in these ads are resolute, courageous and active. In 2009 Nokia launched a new telephone at an event titled Voice Your Action for Indonesia. Individuals and groups with a commitment to advancing the country were invited to promote their causes, with representatives from organisations like Bike to Work, Sahabat Museum, Coin a Chance, Indonesia United, Indonesia Bertindak and Driving Skills for Life taking to the stage as part of the commercial campaign. There were performances of traditional dances. But the emphasis was on building the nation through concrete forms of activism.

To commemorate National Awakening Day in 2010, the health supplement product Fatigon launched a project called The Motivation Movement, which urged Indonesians to work hard and be productive. Viewers are introduced to Pak Solihun as his friend carries him into a hardware store. Solihun cannot walk but the voice-over tells us that he is a motivated man who never succumbs to his condition. This trait is said to represent the national identity and the spirit of Indonesia. We see Solihun assembling electrical equipment well into the night, his energy boosted by the health supplement. He then smiles brightly and the ad moves to display the fruits of his labour. We see a female announcer in front of the building that houses a radio station. At this point viewers are informed that Ahmad Solihun Ihsan is the man behind Radio AS that broadcasts in Indramayu, West Java. He is Fatigon’s chosen role model for productivity. The ad ends with the call to ‘work harder and do your best!’ Valuing self-made people, other individuals celebrated in this series of commercials include Agung Nugroho, who built up a successful laundry business from a single washing machine and dryer to 130 outlets, and Susi Susanti, the world class badminton player. The ad was run in conjunction with a competition in which members of the public were invited to submit ideas for productive and empowering initiatives.

Similar formats appear in commercials for the coffee brand Kapal Api and for Coca Cola. Kapal Api opens with the statement ‘Indonesia, a nation with the spirit to create’. Tradition and modernity are interspersed, with images of young professionals crossing a busy street, football supporters, an academic seminar, a scene of a Hindu woman praying, a young puppeteer performing and a group of men moving a bamboo house. In 2011 the brand launched a program titled A Cup of Spirit for Indonesia inviting people to submit words of encouragement through their website or Twitter account. For every entry submitted the brand pledged to donate two books to schools in nine regions, seven of which are located outside Java. On Youth Pledge Day in 2011, Coca Cola launched a new campaign themed Dare to Change. This was a contest, like the Fatigon competition, to source proposals from the public, which the company would mentor and fund. The accompanying commercial showcased earlier initiatives of the brand in Indonesia, like beach cleaning programs, football competitions and the Coca Cola Learning Centres. The campaign is endorsed by Panji Pragiwaksono, the personality behind the youth-oriented nationalist movement, Indonesia Unite.

These ads differ from the purely nationalistic ones because instead of celebrating cultural diversity they focus on actively bringing about change through collaborations with experienced and well-networked civil society groups. Greater involvement from the public is not only accepted, but encouraged. The message is not that of the richness of cultural heritage but progress through hard labour and encouraging people to work for a better tomorrow. Here the commercial world is tapping into a surge of nationalism among urban Indonesians who believe that nation building is no longer controlled by the state.

Ads generating change?

The first group of ads, which portray Indonesia as a country rich in cultural diversity, appropriate the discourse adopted by the state during the Suharto era. These ads highlight tradition and heritage, while at the same time positioning the audience as visitors and explorers experiencing the local culture as tourists or outsiders. The second group position Indonesia as a nation of strong-willed people, driven to create a better future. By moving away from classic depictions of cultural heritage, they frame Indonesians as agents of change, driven by the motivation to build a better Indonesia.

Implicitly, however, both types of advertisments are directed chiefly at urban middle class Indonesians. This group can afford to be tourists and values modernity, self-direction and upward mobility. It remains to be seen if this second narrative can gain wider ground. If it does, the potential impact on social activism, entrepreneurship and commitment to change might just be what Indonesia needs.

Stefani Haning Swarati (swarati@gmail.com) is a PhD candidate in the Department of Sociology at the National University of Singapore and an Asia Research Institute PhD Scholar.

Ellen Roberts

Workers joining the strike in Bekasi Ocha Hermawan

‘Are you ready to be sacked?’ ‘We’re ready!’, answers the crowd of 50 factory workers. ‘Are you ready to be sacked?’, asks the union leader again. ‘Remember the union is not a god. We cannot protect you. All you have is each other, but if you are united you will be strong.’

The workers, all men, are from an Indonesian sheet metal factory in one of the industrial zones east of Jakarta. Their factory is yet to be unionised, but they’re all keen to improve their wages and conditions. ‘Okay, those of you who have a mobile phone get it out. We’re going to do some calculations,’ says the union leader. Together the group calculates their monthly wage including overtime. It comes to Rp.900,000, around $A90. This is half the legal minimum wage. ‘For that amount of money you may as well be a stone breaker. Do you want to break stones? If you want to fight to achieve your rights you have nothing to lose.’

The sheet metal workers are meeting with the union leader on an unused road bridge that juts out over a small river in Bekasi, east of Jakarta. Bekasi is home to five massive industrial parks, centres for Japanese, Korean, Chinese and Indonesian automobile, electronics, pharmaceutical and other factories. The bridge was abandoned after opposition from the local villagers prevented it from being completed, and several months ago the Indonesian Metalworkers Union (FSPMI) took it over for union meetings. They now have a 24 hour presence here.

Said Iqbal addresses the strikers Ocha Hermawan

A national strike

Tonight it’s 2 October 2012 and the bridge is even more crowded than usual. Tomorrow, factory workers will strike across Indonesia and the workers in Bekasi are expected to turn out in force. The workers are striking over the use of third party labour hire companies, also referred to as outsourcing. Of the 30 million people in formal labour in Indonesia, it is estimated that 20 million are employed by labour hire companies rather than directly by their factory or other main employer. These arrangements lead to lower wages and job insecurity.

On paper, Indonesian labour law restricts the use of outsourcing to catering, security and other ancillary services, but in practice its use is much more widespread. In a statement for the press, the coalition of unions calling the national strike blamed the dominance of outsourcing in Indonesian factories on the unwillingness of the state to intervene in industrial relations and enforce existing laws.

At 8am the next day, we watch the striking workers streaming from the 90 factories in the East Jakarta Industrial Park to join the demonstration. Each of the five industrial parks in Bekasi will see a day long strike and demonstration. From a distance we can see around 50,000 workers gathered around what the Metalworkers Union calls their Commando Car, which is fitted out with a sound system and massive speakers.

The mood is jubilant. Union flags proliferate and between speeches the crowd dances to union songs and the latest Indonesian pop music. Songs by Iwan Fals, the folk hero of the reformasi period that led to the fall of Suharto, are included in the play list. It is sweltering and the crowd appreciates the periodic spray from a fire hose.

The disused bridge that has become a centre of labour activism Ocha Hermawan

That afternoon, back at the bridge, union leaders and workers crowd around the television watching coverage of the strike. The Indonesian media focuses its coverage on the controversial practice of ‘sweeping’, where unions and workers enter a factory by force and demand all workers there join the strike. The union says sweeping gives vulnerable workers a chance to strike without fear of repercussions from their employer. Sofjan Wanandi from the Employers Association told the Jakarta Post that workers were intimidated into joining the strike, and that they really wanted to keep on working.

The Indonesian media chooses not to focus on the significance of Indonesia’s first ever national strike: not only what it means for the 2.8 million workers who joined the strike, but also for the united unions who felt strong enough to call it. Said Iqbal, who is the president of the FSPMI as well as the leader of one of Indonesia’s confederation of unions, the KSPI, has been credited with healing splits in the union movement that have existed since the fall of Suharto.

New found unity

An Australian lawyer working with the FSPMI says, ‘Union leaders from the FSPMI are transforming industrial relations in Indonesia, not only between employers and workers, but also between unions. What continues to impress me is the dedication of the people working for the FSPMI. Many work for free, living off donations and spending all their time talking to workers about their rights. Even some high up officials are not paid,’ she says.

Part of the success of the unions is their ability to combine Islam with the struggle for workers’ rights. This enables them to remain relevant to the lives of workers, and the principles of Islam assist the workers in making arguments for better treatment. In concluding his speech in East Jakarta Industrial Park, FSPMI leader Said Iqbal tells workers, ‘the angels will come down and take you to heaven for what you have done today.’

Ellen Roberts (roberts.ellen.x@gmail.com) is an environmental campaigner and legal advocate based in Melbourne.

Ian Wilson

Displaying imperviousness to pain Ian Wilson

I followed Bang Cep on his nightly rounds of the food stalls surrounding the bus terminal. This was Bang Cep’s territory and he walked with an exaggerated swaggering confidence. Vendors he approached for their ‘protection’ fee greeted him politely, but their eyes betrayed an apprehension bordering on fear. At Pak Dede’s fried tofu stall Bang Cep loudly berated him for his lateness in paying his dues, slamming his ring encrusted hand on the flimsy wooden stall to emphasis the point. Eyes downcast, Pak Dede muttered an apology, promising to pay in full, with interest, the next day.

I returned to Pak Dede’s foodstall later that evening for dinner. Asking him about the encounter with Bang Cep, he let out a pained sigh, ‘Yeah, as you saw that’s what we have to deal with. We don’t like it, but what can we do? People say he is invulnerable, plus he is close to the police. Either way, if it weren’t him it would be someone else. For now at least he is the biggest cock around here, and unless we want to get bashed we do what he says.’

Extortion, intimidation and beatings at the hands of jago – literally a ‘cock’ or ‘rooster’, but colloquially a descriptor for a type of local strongman – constitute an unsavoury aspect of everyday life in urban and rural centres throughout Indonesia. During the New Order the power and longevity of a jago was ultimately dependent upon favourable relationships with the police, military and political elites. In the post-New Order environment, the fragmentation of previous patronage networks, the unravelling of the New Order criminal state together with the peculiar dynamics of decentralised, democratised Indonesia has created more spaces in which jago can thrive. With greater freedom from reliance upon backing or sanction by state elites, many groups have grown substantially, with branches, franchises and networks of supporters spread throughout the city. At the same time however competition between rival groups has increased as the market in ‘protection’ has become more crowded.

Despite associations with criminality, in Indonesian popular culture, the jago is also often romanticised as a champion of the people and an embodiment of the virile and virtuous man, whose acts of violence are motivated by a deep sense of justice, honour and order, one that transcends that of the law and the state. In the world of jago, notions of masculinity, honour and virility are inextricably bound with those of territoriality and the body. A jago’s power, like that of the state, is in large part judged by the extent of his control over his turf – the street, neighbourhood, market or bus terminal where his gang controls the extraction of illegal fees imposed usually on the pretext of offering protection.

Turf, honour and potency

Reputation is perhaps the single most valuable asset of a jago. The defence of one’s honour from perceived insult is inextricably linked to this name and the ability to exert power over turf. The importance of reputation has especially become the case in the context of the private security industry in Jakarta, where a reputation for getting things done and an ability to maintain ‘order’ is crucial to securing contracts in an increasingly competitive market. It is equally crucial, though, in other locations such as markets and bus terminals. Without such a reputation, a jago is no longer a jago, but simply a jago wannabe.

Jago are commonly understood as using violence as both a first and last resort. But for those seeking to make a living as a jago the use of actual physical violence is highly calculated and measured, even when ‘face’ is at stake. Violence is a tool of communication, useful in so far as it helps in the establishment and maintenance of a name and territory. Once this name is consolidated, the necessity to rely upon violence as the central means of maintaining territorial dominance diminishes significantly.

The ‘art’, then, of the jago’s violence, is to find a balance between fear and respect, to balance the necessity of ruthlessly suppressing challenges to his territorial domain and upholding honour, while not going so far as to alienate himself from the immediate community, or unnecessarily antagonise rivals or the police. At the same time they must cultivate relationships with other local power holders, such as officials, the military and business interests. Being a successful ‘career jago’ thus also requires sophisticated diplomatic and negotiating skills, as well as political shrewdness. In the context of decentralised electoral politics this has seen some jago make the transition to elected official, branch leaders of political parties and even into parliament.

Shortcuts to the superhuman

Even in the context of a modern metropolis like Jakarta, belief in the possession of supernatural abilities is often still an important element in the establishment of the jago’s name. These can include a number of fantastic skills such as invisibility, the ability to be in two places at once, mind-reading and hypnotism. The most important of these, however, is ilmu kebal, a term referring to physical invulnerability from weapons such as knives and firearms. Traditionally the pursuit of kebal was achieved after a long period of tutelage and ascetic trials under the direction of a recognised master. But constant tensions over turf boundaries and general volatility that ensues in crowded urban centres such as Jakarta, together with the difficulties in accessing a suitably secluded space has resulted in the emergence of ‘fast track’ methods for achieving it.

Pak Edi, a gang leader in South Jakarta, is the inventor of one such method. As he explains it, ‘The benefit of this method is that you don’t have to be 100 per cent clean. Even if you have been drinking, gambling or playing with women it still works!’ After asking him to explain further, he suggested that I undergo the ‘procedure’. I agreed, but was immediately alarmed as his assistant produced a strange tangle of electric cords and metal plates. Plugging the cord into an electric socket, I was instructed to place my foot on top of one of the plates. Pak Edi held the other plate under his own foot, and immediately his leg began to quiver from the electric current. Tentatively I placed my other foot down on the tile floor earthing the current, sending my limbs into mild spasms as electricity pulsed through my body. While trying to resist the natural urge to let go, Pak Edi firmly grasped my forearms, closed his eyes and muttered a jumbled mantra, a mixture of Arabic, Indonesian and Javanese. After what seemed like an eternity – and with the soles of my foot feeling as if they were about to combust – Pak Edi finally let go and I jerked back into my chair, my arms quivering uncontrollably for several minutes. ‘That’s it!’ he said with a smile. ‘Now you don’t have to worry about being stabbed!’

Like most jago leaders, Pak Edi rejects any suggestion that his group is criminal, insisting that the security and protection they provide to the community from thieves, pickpockets and drug dealers is a valuable service for which they receive modest ‘voluntary contributions’ from local businesses and vendors. This claim is not without foundation. In an area where the police are rarely seen and trusted even less, many daily policing tasks are carried out by groups such as Pak Edi’s. In his early 50s, with a portly frame and persistent smoker’s cough, Pak Edi is respected and feared by younger and more physically fit local men, who commonly refer to him as possessing supernatural power and as being charismatic and authoritative. With his unique ‘modern’ method for achieving ilmu, he draws followers from outside of his neighbourhood in Kebayoran Lama, some from as far away as Surabaya. His reputation for ilmu also helped him to expand his gang’s network (with, what he claimed, was a minimum of conflict) to include branches in other parts of the city. His authority rests not, then, on his physical prowess but upon his political skills and a cultivated mystical aura.

Tests invulnerability atop a bed of nails Ian Wilson

Fortifying the body in times of crisis

In times of social and political upheaval where fears emerge regarding the maintaining of personal and social boundaries, belief in invulnerability practices continue to resurface as a last line of bodily defence against social breakdown. During the tumultuous period of social and political change surrounding the resignation of Suharto in 1998, popular tabloids filled with advertisements for ‘instant kebal’ through mantra sent via SMS, as well as short course ‘executive packages’ run by jago seeking to profit from uncertainty. Today in Jakarta there are many selling invulnerability, together with an array of other supernatural powers and abilities.

Armed with kebal the body of the jago is fortified against the dangers of external attack, transforming the physical body into a virtual fortress. That kebal has frequently been proven throughout Indonesian history to be a completely ineffective form of physical protection has not diminished faith in its efficiency. During the struggle for independence, belief in invulnerability saw many run head-first to their deaths at the hands of Dutch machine guns. Not infrequently today, there are reports in local news of an invulnerability test gone wrong, such as occurred in Cilingcing in North Jakarta in early 2012 where two young men died after being bathed in sulphuric acid. Yet despite tragedies such as this interest remains high.

Perhaps, then, the enduring power of belief in invulnerability is related less to its practical uses than it is to its centrality to notions of the empowered, potent and masculine body embodied in the figure of the jago. To be kebal is not just to be free from the fear of being stabbed, but rather to achieve a particular kind of autonomy, to be impervious to external threats and, potentially, to be able to exert ones will over others. With this power one can become the biggest cock.

Ian Wilson (i.wilson@murdoch.edu.au) teaches in the Asian Studies and Security and Politics programs at Murdoch University in Western Australia. This article draws on a chapter Ian contributed to Men and Masculinities in Southeast Asia (eds Michele Ford and Lenore Lyons, Routledge 2012).

Annie Tucker

Between My Mother and Father There’s Me Ahmad Soleh

In one room, a stained Arabic tunic is plastered to the wall with red flame burning from its neck where a head should be. Across from it, in the midst of a smoky haze, a tattered skirt floats inches off the ground. If you look closely a thin red thread attaches the two articles of clothing, forming a ghostly couple. In another room, an indistinct figure with bloodied legs cradles a decapitated bearded face, proclaiming ‘I love my father’s head.’ In a third room, a door swings on its hinges, on one side the naked figure of a man forever on his way out and on the other the figure of a woman, dressed in a purple gown sprinkled with stars, enacting her faithful return.

These haunted rooms were part of The Imitation Journey, the recent solo exhibition of an emerging young artist named Khadir Supartini held at Tujuh Bintang Art Space in Yogyakarta from 11-15 April 2012. The show featured large-scale paintings, collage, sculpture, and installation, which Khadir described as pieces that ‘are like intermediaries between my feelings and my artistic practice’. The theme of the show is Khadir’s effort to tell the story of his obscure origins and claim an authentic personal creative identity, yet this intimate approach may also prove to be part of a growing claim for fine art’s new role in contemporary Indonesian discourse on identity.

Khadir’s Story

At the heart of Khadir’s story is his absent father. When she was just a teenager, Khadir’s mother, Supartini, left her farming family in the outskirts of Yogyakarta to work in Medina, Saudi Arabia, as a migrant domestic worker. According to family lore, Khadir’s father was a member of the upper-class family for which she worked and over the course of her two and a half year contract the pair fell in love. His family forbade a marriage and Supartini returned home to rural Java. Khadir’s father briefly followed but ultimately returned to the Middle East and cut off all contact with his wife and son, christened Ahmad Abdul Khadir, who was still an infant. When Khadir was in elementary school his mother re-married a Javanese man and moved to her new husband’s home leaving her son behind to be cared for by his grandmother and nearby relatives, occasionally stopping by to check in on him.

Obstinate Spring Ahmad Soleh

Growing up, in between untamed hours spent hanging out on Marlioboro Street, racing motorcycles, listening to Boomerang and Led Zeppelin and getting drunk with his fellow art school classmates, Khadir had to piece together an image of his father based on the recollections of family and friends, treasuring the few details he discovered as carefully as he treasured the few items his father had left behind – the long tunic he would later collage onto canvas, a pair of sandals. He says, ‘It was difficult to reconstruct an image of my father. All I knew about him was from my neighbours telling me that he was tall.’ When Khadir was in his early twenties, he decided to search for his father and himself got a job as a foreign labourer as close as he could to Medina, in Qatar. After a year of working in ornamental design he was about to set off across the border to Saudi Arabia when his mother became distraught and, via telephone from Indonesia, begged him not to go. He instead returned home to Sleman, took his mother’s name as his own, and began in earnest his life as an artist as Khadir Supartini.

New directions

Khadir’s story is dramatic and compelling, but not necessarily unusual. Approximately one million Indonesian women go abroad as domestic workers each year, and many of them become involved in romantic relationships that are formal and informal, sanctioned and secretive. In certain publicised and upsetting cases, Indonesian women have been the subject of sexual harassment and even rape at the hands of their foreign employers. In other cases, workers’ long separations from their husbands and children, or the formation of bi-cultural families over vast distances, can have negative repercussions on family life.

Slipping In and Out of Dreams Ahmad Soleh

However, it is unusual that such a personal story would be chosen as a theme for a solo exhibition of fine art. Autobiographical or confessional artwork remains rare in Indonesia. As journalist Kurnianto described it in his review of the show for The Yogyakarta Daily, the typical Indonesian approach can be described as being one in which ‘Shame should be completely covered up. Don’t put it on display. Even to discuss it is already taboo, especially if the shame involves family problems.’ Some significant Indonesian fine artists have portrayed members of their families in their paintings, such as Affandi’s portraits of himself with his grandchildren, and others have reflected on matters of personal significance, such as Nasirun’s visual meditations on the role of Javanese Muslim spirituality in his life.

A rich body of fine art in Indonesia is highly critical of political and socio-economic oppression, from Raden Saleh’s works resisting Dutch colonial authority up until Entang Wiharso’s post-reformasi NusaAmuk and Taring Padi’s activist art. However, it remains rare for artists to use their work to reveal how socio-political conditions have affected them personally and it is rarer still for an Indonesian fine artist to explore the complex or conflicted psychological aspects of such personal experiences.

I Love My Father’s Head Ahmad Soleh

In this environment, Khadir’s admission of the details of his background, along with the imagery he uses to express his feelings about it, is uniquely bold. In addition to the paintings described above, Khadir’s exhibition features works with a man’s head smashed inside a urinal, a Middle-Eastern male figure eyeing a sex doll, and a similar figure daydreaming naked amidst clouds of condoms. But it also features Edenic couples in the bloom of love, and a number of abstract expressionist self-portraits. Freud would have a lot to analyse in Khadir’s striking and often poignant combinations of idolatry, accusation, and self-examination. He also might be interested to hear Khadir say openly, as he did in one interview, that one of the song lyrics inspiring the show was the Doors echo of Oedipus: ‘Father I want to kill you, Mother, I want to sleep with you.’

An enthusiastic response

The exhibition has received significant local peer, critical, and media attention, perhaps precisely because it addresses such rarely-discussed issues while bringing a new psychological perspective to familiar problems. On the opening night of Khadir’s solo exhibition, this new approach was hailed as courageous and recognised as a significant development in Indonesian fine art. Rusnoto Susanto, the curator, observed that the collection of works ‘presents a number of personal and social realisations where the will to capture the essence of his direct experience becomes a reference for others.’ Entang Wiharso, in opening the show, said he believed that Khadir had the potential to become a ‘national monument’.

But would Indonesia ever really claim for a national monument a young man who is the product of a bi-cultural and shamefully ‘broken’ home, who speaks in such confessional and conflicted tones? What might such a new direction mean for Indonesian fine art and what might it mean for contemporary Indonesians coming to terms with their own public and private identities? Perhaps, more than ten years after reformasi, which opened the floodgates for creative expression and debate, the interweaving of the personal and the political and the use of confessional or autobiographical material to trigger public dialogue is an idea whose time has come. It may be that the art world will provide an important venue for such a dialogue.

Imagining Khadir’s Father Ahmad Soleh

Perhaps it is more than coincidence that The Imitation Journey came to fruition in tandem with the Jakarta launching of the large-scale travelling exhibit RE.CLAIM, which featured more than 60 Indonesian artists working across the archipelago and internationally. RE.CLAIM was created at the request of Dr Melani Setiawan in celebration and promotion of her new book, Indonesian Art World: 1977-2011. Melani is a significant figure in the art scene, and the book presents many of the photographs she has taken over more than three decades attending events and befriending artists. In opening up her personal archive to the public, she challenged artists to do likewise, to make or display work that reflected the interaction of their creative work with their private lives and incorporated elements from their own personal archives. This show marked one of the first major collections of explicitly autobiographical works by Indonesian artists, many of which culled personal mementos or mined painful personal experiences and connected that pain to past and present artistic projects offered for public consumption. A co-curator of the show, Christine Cocca said that such an event was groundbreaking since 'the term… personal [has a] long and complicated history in Indonesia where the collective is prized over the individual’.

Looking ahead

Meanwhile, Khadir Supartini is back in his studio planning his next solo show. His unusual height and light skin hints at his mixed heritage as he works on a fibreglass sculpture of an imposing head, which at one point he cradles affectionately. He says, ‘the most important capital an artist has is honesty, what he or she feels. You have to take what is closest to you. An artist has to be attuned to a condition or situation. For example, maybe someone is interested in making work about corruption, but the artist doesn’t actually know that much about corruption…to me that’s sort of just like making it up. An artist has to truly dig deep.’

With this perspective Khadir challenges himself and other contemporary Indonesian artists to tell their own stories while pursuing their craft. Rather than protesting for protests sake, or making merely representational paintings, the role of the artist is to take the chance of investigating and revealing the self – family issues, dark urges, and all. Khadir will certainly be an artist to watch as he continues to explore these issues while offering viewers both potent social critique and moving personal imagery.

Annie Tucker (actucker@ucla.edu) works as a writer and research assistant for Elemental Productions, a documentary film company exploring culture and personal experience in Indonesia. She is also a PhD candidate in UCLA’s Department of World Arts and Cultures/Dance.

Frieda Sinanu and Antje Missbach

Iraqi children playing in an Indonesian village Frieda Sinanu

Nine months ago, Ghaazi (not his real name), a young Afghani, tried to leave Indonesia for the third time within less than a year. Again, he was unlucky. His boat sank near Trenggalek (East Java) and his best friend drowned in front of his eyes. Most of the 250 passengers died, but Ghaazi survived the rough seas for three days and two nights, when he was found by Indonesian fishermen and returned to the Indonesian authorities. When we got to know Ghaazi, he was living in a shelter for unaccompanied refugee minors near Puncak in West Java. Claiming to be under-aged, he was provided with a place to stay and weekly pocket money of Rp 120,000 (A$12) by the United Nations High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR). He had decided to apply for asylum, but he was still awaiting the outcome of his determination process.

While living in Indonesia, Ghaazi met a number of fellow Afghanis who had come to Indonesia much earlier than him, but were still awaiting the outcome of their asylum applications or, if they had been recognised as genuine refugees, for their resettlement to a third country. Ghaazi also knew fellow Afghanis whose applications for protection had been rejected twice or more, but who had lingered on in Indonesia, some of them had become recruiters for people smugglers. Like the people Ghaazi met, Mariyam, her husband and their five young children have been stuck in Indonesia for years on end. Having paid a people smuggler around A$15,000 to escape from Afghanistan to Australia, Indonesia was as far as they got.

After failing three times to reach Australia’s Christmas Island, Mariyam and her family ran out of money and decided to apply for protection from the UNHCR. It took five years to have their claims verified. Once they were accepted as genuine refugees, they applied for resettlement. So far, three possible host countries have rejected them. Mariyam is contemplating selling the few hectares her relatives still own in Afghanistan and make a desperate attempt to reach Australia. Having experienced maritime disasters before, she is dismissive of the dangers at sea. ‘It is better we drown together than wait here one more year.’ Twelve years of uncertainty is extraordinary, but Mariyam’s situation reflects the experiences of many transit migrants stuck in Indonesia.

Long-term limbo

Over the last decade, Indonesia has become a kind of long-term limbo for asylum seekers from conflict-ridden countries including Afghanistan, Iraq, Iran, Sri Lanka, Somalia and Myanmar. According to the UNHCR, the number of refugees and asylum seekers in Indonesia reached over 7100 at the end of August 2012. This is a very conservative figure since not all migrants are registered with the UNHCR. Australian Government statistics show that from January to July 2012 alone more than 6093 people have travelled by boat from Indonesia to Australia.

Several factors have contributed to Indonesia’s growing attractiveness as a place of transit. Not only is Indonesia a close neighbour to Australia, but the Indonesian archipelago is vast. Its 40,000km porous borders provide transit migrants with easy entry and exit points. Also, Indonesia has, until recently, pursued a live-and-let-live attitude to asylum seekers if registered with the UNHCR, which processes their claims for refugee status. However, as a non-signatory of the Refugee Convention, Indonesia does not offer special protection to asylum seekers but refrains from refoulement (forced return). Indonesia prefers to have recognised refugees resettled to third countries and rejected asylum seekers returned home. It has no legal provisions to allow asylum seekers and refugees to integrate permanently into its society.

Most transit migrants hope that their stop in Indonesia will be short-term. But most end up being disappointed. The UNHCR works slowly. Currently, asylum seekers have to wait around ten months for an initial interview. After that interview, it takes about one year for an asylum application to be processed and verified. After obtaining refugee status, a claimant has to wait again – possibly for years – before being resettled to a third country. In the meantime, they have to wait endlessly without means to earn income properly and with little access to the public health and education systems.

Life in transit

When asylum seekers first arrive, by boat to Batam or any other port town in Sumatra, they have to take a plane or bus to Jakarta. It is a lot easier to live there ‘underground’. Jakarta also offers them the opportunity to register with the UNHCR if they wish. Those who can afford to fly directly to Jakarta without transiting in Malaysia or Thailand first. A very common place of transit is the area around Jalan Jaksa because of the cheap dosshouses there. Some also stay for a few days in private apartments that offer them more security. Beyond resting for a few days after often long and exhausting trips, newcomers use their time to gather information about their fellow countrymen residing in Indonesia, find out how to apply with the UNHCR or organise their onward journeys with the help of smuggling agents. Sooner or later, most newly arrived asylum seekers move on to the Puncak area outside of Jakarta, where life is cheaper and the climate more refreshing.

In recent years surveillance by police and immigration authorities has become more ubiquitous. If arrested for breaking Indonesian immigration regulations, asylum seekers are usually put into detention. There are 13 immigration detention centres around the archipelago, where conditions are poor. According to detainees, food is often substandard, and clean water and medical care insufficient. Many detainees suffer from gastroenteritis, dermatitis and depression. Physical and mental abuse by prison guards and fellow inmates take place. Only those who have enough cash to pay bribes can make their lives slightly more comfortable. Hunger strikes occur regularly in some detention centres.

As many immigration detention centres are overcrowded, more and more transit migrants are released to live in monitored local communities. Priority is given to families, women, under-aged detainees and recognised refugees. The Puncak area, Medan and Yogyakarta host the largest number of refugees and asylum seekers outside detention centres. Those under the care of the International Organisation for Migration (IOM) or the UNHCR receive a monthly allowance for housing, food and other daily expenditures and access to health care. Those receiving IOM allowances are relatively better off than those with UNHCR allowances – and of course much better off than those who have to rely on funds sent by family and friends.

Asylum seekers have no lawful residence and have to report their presence to the authorities on a regular basis. Although the general attitude of the community in Indonesia toward them is receptive, interactions between transit migrants and local communities at times are marred by difficulties and misunderstanding due to language and cultural barriers. Many transit migrants do not speak much English or Indonesian. Ghaazi, for example, admitted that he often felt isolated and had run into problems interacting with the locals. The majority of transit migrants are young, single men. Given a number of extra-marital affairs with Indonesian women that became of public knowledge, relations between the local communities and the transit migrants are sometimes strained.

To make matters worse, as foreigners transit migrants have to pay higher prices than locals for things like rent. Other Afghanis living in Puncak reported cases of extortion by locals and by people impersonating police or migration officers. The amount demanded varies. They range from ordinary bribes, when for example caught for driving a motorbike in the village without helmet, to rather substantial sums of protection money. For example, asylum seekers tell of people being visited by unknown people who threatened them with report to the local authorities unless they paid them Rp 5 million (A$ 500).

‘We don’t have much money. We are refugees, not rich tourists, but it is not easy to explain this to the locals’, said one Afghani asylum seeker. However, the fact that they can’t work in Indonesia prevents transit migrants from earning an income. Ghaazi explained that he urgently needed money to send to his mother, who was living with his younger siblings in Pakistan. After his older brother and father had disappeared, she borrowed from different people to pay a smuggler to take Ghaazi to Australia. Although she does the laundry for wealthier neighbours, she cannot make ends meet, yet her creditors keep pushing her to repay the debts.

An impossible situation

The increasingly watchful eyes of the country’s authorities are making life harder. In recent years Indonesia has tightened its immigration regulations. The new regulation issued in 2010, for example, requires migrants to sign a ‘declaration of compliance’. The letter contains five points. First, the migrants should stay at areas designated by the immigration directorate general only. Second, they are prohibited to enter an airport or a seaport area except in the company of immigration officers. Third, they are required to fully comply with Indonesian laws, including not working or engaging in income-generating activities, driving without a licence and upholding order in their neighbourhood. Lastly, they are required to report to the immigration department to update their registration every two weeks. Failure to do so risks detention.

The recently announced pledge by the Australian Government to provide A$10 million as a down payment on building the capacity of transit countries – including Indonesia – to deal with asylum seekers (out of an estimate of $150 million) means that the authorities’ grip on transit migrants will even become tighter. To make things worse, the latest developments recommended by the Houston report has seen the Australian Government returning to a firmer stance in favour for off-shore processing of asylum seekers in order to deter them from coming to Australia by boat. A number of recent maritime disasters have been presented as the main rationale for these deterrence measures, but one wonders whether the death at sea are merely used as a ploy to justify other policies that are part of the package. At the same time, the Australian government has increased the annual intake under its humanitarian program from 13,500 to 20,000 refugees. This number will, however, most likely only include 400-500 extra places for refugees waiting in Indonesia.

In August 2012 alone, more than 1900 asylum seekers arrived in Australia from Indonesia by boat. It almost seems that it has never been easier for people smugglers in Indonesia to recruit passengers. Facing undetermined time in limbo in Indonesia, people take enormous risks to get to Australia. Too many – like the 200-odd people on the boat Ghaazi escaped from – pay for these journeys with their lives.

Frieda Sinanu (frieda.sinanu@gmail.com) is a consultant for development programs in Indonesia. Antje Missbach (antje.missbach@unimelb.edu.au) is a McKenzie postdoctoral fellow at the University of Melbourne. Frieda and Antje are currently researching the situation of transit migrants in Indonesia.

Bobby Anderson

The path from Lolat to Bonohaik. Every day children in Bonohaik walk back and forth to a functioning parallel school on this path. It takes them 1.5 hours, barefoot. Bobby Anderson

Indonesian Papua is not a uniform entity. When outsiders think of Papua, they imagine provincial and national-level political conflicts and protests against Indonesian rule. But this is only the reality for a minority of Papuans in the major towns of Jayapura, Wamena, and Timika, and their suburbs. Outside of select groups within these areas, most people do not engage in political issues related to referendum protests, dialogue with Jakarta, or Merdeka (independence).

Instead, local fissures count more in day-to-day politics. In the province, most people’s primary loyalties are not to an idea of ‘Papua’, nor are contending loyalties to ‘Indonesia’. Instead, most people are above all loyal to their clan, with even broader tribal loyalties being secondary. Loyalties to Papua or Indonesia come a distant third, at best. Whilst Jayapura and Wamena host numerous and often competing groups who agitate for independence, and while a few areas such as Puncak Jaya host active insurrectionists, most of rural Papua is an underdeveloped and detached space where political conflicts are entirely local.

In most places outside of the towns, the key issue is not that Papuans reject the Indonesian state: it is simply that the state plays little or no role in their lives, for better or for worse.

A society without a state

The subdistrict of Lolat, in the newly-created central highlands district of Yahukimo, is illustrative of conditions in the isolated areas where most indigenous Papuans live. What is important to Lolat’s people, and what they lack, is much more immediate and profound than the questions of autonomy or independence that are generally assumed by outsiders to dominate the political thinking of most Papuans. The area lacks any semblance of government, and there is no access to services such as health and education.

Just as Papua ranks 33rd out of 33 Indonesian provinces with regard to Human Development Indicator measurements, so Yahukimo ranks as one of the worst of Papua’s districts. Yahukimo is also one of the most remote areas of Indonesia; it is assessable only by plane. The district has no roads (except for those found within the new district capital, Dekai), and travel within Yahukimo is only possible by foot or airplane; in the lowlands, small boats are used. Yahukimo was created in 2002 when politicians separated it from Jayawijaya district. They said doing so would improve service delivery in isolated areas, bring government closer to its constituents and make it more accountable and transparent in the process. The anticipated benefits of this process did not occur. Rather, the opposite happened, and government, for all intents and purposes, disappeared.

Lolat subdistrict can be reached only by air, from Wamena or Dekai, or by foot. The subdistrict is three days’ walk from Wamena, and two days’ walk from Dekai. The subdistrict centre, Kampung Lolat (elevation 1,959 metres, population 1,110) hosts an airstrip made of pulverised rock, empty government offices, a locked community health centre (puskesmas), and empty schools. Only a few of Lolat’s inhabitants speak Indonesian. There are no shops: a barter economy exists in place of cash, and wealth is found in livestock, namely pigs. The area is populated by the Yali tribe.

Lolat was only ‘contacted’ by outsiders in late September 1968, when an Australian missionary, Stanley Albert Dale, hiked into Lolat’s Seng valley from Ninia. He was killed by the Yali and eaten. Months later, the Indonesian military hiked into Lolat, killed a few men, burned a few homes, and left. No security actor has since returned.

Lolat’s older men remember the killing of Dale and the state’s retaliation. They have no other memory of the coercive elements of the state and they have zero experience with those groups who agitate against it. The area has no mobile phone coverage: news travels via shortwave radio only. Children in the area are visibly malnourished, with bloated stomachs and stunted growth. At the time of the author’s visit, men were noticeably absent from the area, with most working in Wamena or Dekai. The men who were present were usually armed with bows, arrows, and machetes. A local NGO, Yasumat, runs five parallel schools, 19 health clinics, and four health posts. While paid teachers and health care workers are absent, a cadre of local volunteers strives to provide needed services.

From church–led development to state collapse

In Yahukimo, as in other parts of the Papuan highlands, local churches and missionaries provided health and education services prior to the end of the New Order era in 1998. Back then, schools and health centres were staffed and functional, and midwifery services, immunisation programs, and mother and child health programs were easily accessible. The system was paternalistic, but it was relatively effective.

Civil servant absenteeism, now a veritable epidemic in the highlands, was less of an issue, as civil servants were required to be at the posts to which they were assigned; dismissal due to frequent absence was, in that era, possible. Churches and NGOs worked in place of the state to provide health and education services. But they worked with the state’s blessing and in cooperation with it to pay government salaries to the teachers and health care workers on-site. These workers thus did not have to leave their posts and travel to towns to collect their wages, by flight or several days’ walking, as they do now. As these systems were run by local churches, management of workers was direct.

After the end of the New Order, local governments took over health and education services. But this happened without a clear rationale and in the absence of sufficient understanding in provincial and district centres as to the role that churches played in remote areas. Some government officials saw the takeover as a means to move into the provision of services which they had always viewed as being the proper responsibility of government. Others believed that church influence should be lessened. No doubt some simply wanted to gain access to the funds that these services provided.

Regardless of the reasons, the takeover resulted in the breakdown of the established system. As in the broader failures found in the creation of new districts across Papua, there was no period of transition and no handover. After the takeover, these systems were no longer managed locally, with new government administrators based in district capitals remotely running systems in places they’d never visited, with employees they’d never met. The churches played no post-2002 managerial or oversight role, instead concentrating on ecclesiastical matters. The system was further shaken by the 2001 riots in Wamena, when dozens of Indonesian migrants were killed by Papuan rioters. These killings created a reverse migration as fearful migrants – many of them teachers and health care workers – left to the cities.

The handover of the systems from Jayawijaya to the new district of Yahukimo in 2002 was the coup de grâce. Schools and clinics emptied of remaining teachers, health cadres, and administrators (the reasons why are elaborated upon below). In Yahukimo, with the exception of Dekai, the visible manifestations of a functioning government disappeared. This collapse of the education system has led to illiteracy rates that are much worse than the provincial average: anecdotal evidence puts the illiteracy rate in Lolat at upwards of 80 per cent.

As for health, immunisation programs do not exist in remote areas: the cold chain for vaccinations broke down in 2002 and no immunisations have been provided by the district government outside of intermittent offerings in Dekai in the last ten years. TB and HIV rates in Lolat are unknown, but the number of young men, women, and children dying of unknown causes is out of proportion to the already abysmal provincial averages. It seems likely that men working in the cities as part of the construction boom caused by the proliferation of new districts are contracting HIV and bringing it home with them. Just as HIV infection levels are unknown, so are condoms, which have never been seen in the area.

Men are also contracting malaria in lowland Dekai. When they return to Lolat, which has no mosquitoes and thus no knowledge of malaria, they die from it. Clinics are stocked with expired or unlabeled medicines, and health knowledge is low.

Problems of governance

Problems in education and health cannot be disentangled from one another: neither can they be removed from problems in governance. In Yahukimo the actual word for governance in Indonesian (pemerintahan) requires explanation. Government in Yahukimo, where it exists, is solely the realm of the Yali tribe’s clan and extended family networks and their traditions. This is a complicated system. In the Lolat area, the Yali tribe is sub-divided into 11 clans (suku): Buesuk, Hwise Oholuk, Kangkin, Wom ingkik, Sukulik dindok, Sabumbo, Ngasim, Nguruni, Sahaikani, Sirik amboloak, and Suamalik. These 11 clans are further sub-divided into a minimum of 41 extended families (marga).

The clans often go to war with one another, and even the extended families within clans operate in contention with one another. These groups are all led by men, and the strongest among them serve as church leaders, village leaders, and so on. They tend to assert their authority among their own followers by coercion and patronage. In such traditional patronage systems, modern notions of corruption lose their stigma: corrupt practices allow for goods to enter the patronage system, where it disseminates through the family and clan.

Special Autonomy (known in Papua by its Indonesian abbreviation, Otsus) was introduced in 2001 with the intention of relieving pressures for independence, alleviating Papua’s underdevelopment and improving service delivery. The policy has also led to a dramatic increase in government funds available for development purposes. However, an overstaffed and underperforming provincial bureaucracy absorbs the majority of Otsus funds. The primary expenditure of such funds in rural and remote areas goes toward the visible manifestations of service: building health clinics and schools.

However, the essential problem of health and education services in the highlands is not lack of physical structures, but poor management of human resources in these areas. New buildings remain empty, and although civil servants are theoretically assigned to work in these areas, the vast majority of them are not present in their duty stations. This is the norm across the highlands.

The reasons for absenteeism are manifold and vary by area, but some generalisations can be made. First, civil servants are often assigned outside their areas of origin or residence, and so are extremely resistant to being separated from their families. Locals often look down on them because their tribal or clan affiliations differ from their areas of assignation. Second, civil servant absenteeism does not result in sanctions. Third, these civil servants are not paid on-site, nor are they provided with transportation costs reflective of the cost of transport in their assigned areas. Fourth, their salaries are not adequate, often because a portion is siphoned off by the administration before they are paid (this varies by areas: in some areas, this does not occur, whilst in others, the majority of one’s wages is mislaid). Fifth, necessary support structures are not in place: a teacher who wants to teach may find herself alone in a school, with no administrator, no other teachers, and no materials. A teacher assigned to a remote area might not want to relocate her family because there is no available health care; a health care worker may not want to relocate because, chances are, there will be no functioning school.

Developing the villages?

One example of how special autonomy programs run into trouble on the ground in places like Yahukimo is provided by the so-called Kampung Development Strategy Plan or RESPEK (Rencana Strategi Pembangunan Kampung) program. Created in 2007 by the then-Papua provincial governor, Barnabus Suebu, RESPEK is a recurring community development block grant allocation for every village in the province, funded by Otsus disbursements that are in turn funded by the returns from Papua’s natural resource wealth. Under the scheme, every village in Papua gets a block grant of Rp. 100 million (about $A10,000). Of this, 15 per cent is intended to be for projects that directly benefit women.

A medical clinic in Lolat. All of these medicines are expired or water damaged. Bobby Anderson

By transferring the funds directly from the province to villages, RESPEK is intended to eliminate the district layer through which fund disbursement would normally occur, therefore removing a significant opportunity for the siphoning of funds. The idea is that communities will discuss for themselves what projects to prioritise and spend their money on. So far, the majority of programs funded have been in infrastructure, including the construction of roads, bridges, schools, and health centres. All in all, the government has spent three trillion rupiah (about three hundred million Australian dollars) on RESPEK projects.

Despite this program reaching Yahukimo, in Lolat community access to education and health services, as well as economic opportunities, has not improved in the slightest. Though the money is delivered to Lolat’s villages, Lolat’s people are unaware of RESPEK’s community-driven development methodology. They also know nothing of the allocation for women’s projects. They rank livelihood opportunities such as the provision of livestock above infrastructure, but RESPEK creates infrastructure. In Yahukimo this is because local elites within the traditional structure of 11 clans and extended families control the project selection process through direct interaction with RESPEK facilitators. RESPEK has simply been absorbed into pre-existing Yali systems based in part on patronage, and this is why infrastructure projects are popular. It is the local elites who are the contractors who work on the infrastructure programs, and the stated value of materials and costs usually differs from the actual value, with much of the funding being skimmed off and used elsewhere.

Traditional concepts of what makes a leader also determine how this money is utilised. In the Yali areas of the highlands, as in much of Melanesian society, the role of a leader – often known as a ‘Big Man’ – is to disseminate wealth to followers. RESPEK often partially fills the need of Big Men to access and then disseminate wealth, and therefore, this funding does trickle down to the grassroots, with funding translating into Rp. 50,000 ($A5) per household per year, for example. And just as Big Men disseminate such wealth to followers, they exclude the followers of others. As a result, suku and marga loyalties can be re-arranged based upon the wealth their leading members make available to followers. There exists a constant battle among Big Men, and their expanding and constricting constituencies reflect this. These battles extend into elections, and suku or marga that vote for the losing candidate will find themselves cut off from development programs and other assistance as punishment.

In Lolat, village and clan leaders use RESPEK to pay pocket money for work that used to be done for free, such as maintaining the runway and trails that connect villages. This use of the funds was decided upon by those clan leaders who also serve as village leaders. The funds are not being used for health, education, or other services which might make a real long-term difference to the lives of ordinary people there. Innovative uses of RESPEK for service delivery, livelihoods and women’s emplowerment are found elsewhere in Papua, but not here.

To make matters worse, because so many men were working outside of Lolat in previous years, traditional gardens that families maintained to grow yams, tubers, and other staples, have been neglected. The last RESPEK allocations were used by local leaders to charter planes to fly in rice, which was then distributed freely. This rice was eaten through and ran out, and Lolat’s communities are now dangerously exposed to the possibility of dependence on such imported foods. In the past, families maintained gardens that provided them with the staple foods that they needed. And so RESPEK, which was intended to deliver improvements to people’s lives, has instead made them more dependent, and more exposed to risk.

Making government work

The importance of effective service delivery in Lolat, as in Papua’s other rural and remote areas, where the majority of the population lives, cannot be underestimated. The lives of people in Papua are not easy and politicians’ promises to make things better have not been realised. Across large parts of the highlands there is little evidence of the state, other than empty schools, health clinics and hospitals. Civil servants, police, and military are few and far between. Often the only outsiders who identify with, and work to improve the lives of, Papuans, are religious missionaries from Manado and further afield, and there are not many of them. Just as security actors are rare, so are the rebels: in Yahukimo, there is no OPM or other insurrectionist presence.

During my two visits to the area, I did not hear a single sentiment expressed for or against the Indonesian state in Lolat. But people talked a lot about their palpable needs: the need for doctors and teachers, the need for medicines and materials. People expressed a desire for a better future for themselves and their children: they want their children to understand computers and learn English, for example. And when children articulate what they wish to become, they speak of becoming teachers and doctors: exactly the people their communities both need and lack.

Papua’s rural population is the purported audience for the political machinations and aspirations of the opposing elites who exist so far above them that they might as well be a part of the spirit world. So far, no politicians speak for these people. Yet Lolat’s people know of events in Jayapura and further afield, even if they are not yet much interested in them. In the long term, their opinions and loyalties are up for grabs. Where they direct those loyalties will depend much on whether a functioning state can be built that tangibly benefits them.

Bobby Anderson (rubashov@yahoo.com) works on health, education, and governance projects in Eastern Indonesia, and he travels frequently in Papua province.

En-Chieh Chao

Pentecostals prefer an expressive and emotive worship style En-Chieh Chao

On a November afternoon in 2009, I was pulled from the torrential rain into the muddy entrance of a church by Frances, a student studying English at Satya Wacana University in Salatiga, Central Java. She high-fived the person handing out news bulletins at the door, and ran into the worship hall with me in tow. As the sound of evangelical rock grew louder, I saw a giant screen hanging in the air, projecting slides of lyrics and images. Microphone stands, drums, electronic guitars, and musicians filled the space beneath. A young female worship leader was leading the congregation through gospel rock to soft ballads, with nine spandex-clad dancers to her left and three tambourine dancers spinning before her in white tulle dresses.

A full hour of singing and dancing climaxed with the resounding voices of bahasa roh, the Indonesian term for speaking in tongues. Congregants raised their hands, some embracing each other. People were murmuring or shouting unintelligible words. Their faces were distorted, their eyes tightly shut with deep frowns on their brows. This, as I later learned, was the worship style of churches that are labeled ‘pentakosta’ for their doctrines and ‘karismatik’ for their ways of worshipping.

A new generation

Under the legacy of New Order mandatory religious affiliation and religious education, as well as the influence of transnational Christian media and missionary networks, even the children of ‘nominal Christian’ parents nowadays display a more deeply internalised Christianity as an integral part of their self-identity. Unsatisfied with what they view as the superficial religious affiliations of their parents and grandparents, they have begun to see mainstream churches as soulless places to worship God. In an interesting parallel to the phenomenon of the children of Javanist Muslims becoming orthodox, many offspring of mainstream church members have become born-again Christians over the last two decades.

Recent figures suggest that among Indonesia’s approximately 17 million Protestants, 6 million are Pentecostals, many of whom are still registered members of mainstream churches. This number might be even larger if we count Christians in other churches that do not claim the Pentecostal label, but have adopted the charismatic styles that distinguish Pentecostalism. This trend represents a remarkable religious transformation of Christianity in Indonesia, where the Protestant minority has historically displayed a rather sober brand of Calvinism. The mainline Javanese Christian Church (GKJ), for example, has long featured a sedate worship style. The expressive charismatic worship style – clapping, yelling, loud pop gospel music – is growing, but still relatively uncommon.

Charismatic churches’ dynamic worship styles have also developed a cosmopolitan texture. English songs are enjoyed beside Indonesian ones. The Australian rock and worship band the ‘Planetshakers’ is highly popular, and so is the Indonesian band ‘True Worshippers’. The born-again Pentecostals diligently read Indonesian translations of gospel books written by American authors such as Joyce Meyer and Choo Thomas. Their Indonesian versions have become bestsellers. Even the Hebrew word ‘sialom’ (shalom) has been creatively appropriated as the Pentecostal counterpart of the Muslim greeting ‘Assalamualaikum,’ and is uttered in services and daily life alike.

Indonesian translations of American gospel books have become best sellers En-Chieh Chao

Contesting pluralism

In the contemporary vista of Indonesian Christianity, Pentecostalism also appears transformative because of its power to transcend ethnic divides. Most of Indonesia’s Christian communities have been ethnically defined since the colonial period. In many of the Pentecostal churches today, however, the ethnic profile is pluralistic. Like their predecessors from Azusa Street in Los Angeles, Brazil and Zimbabwe, these new Pentecostal churches have developed followings that are more ethnically inclusive than their mainline counterparts.

In Java, Chinese-Indonesian and Javanese believers worship together, and both serve as leaders in Pentecostal congregations, despite the history of uneasy relations between Chinese and other ethnic groups. Many Chinese Indonesians favour Pentecostalism because it enables them to overcome negative stereotypes by emphasising prosperity as a sign of God’s grace. They strive to become moral exemplars in society. As a result of frequent coordination between different groups, it is not out of the ordinary for ethnic Chinese pastors to preach to Javanese congregants, or vice versa. Ethnic groups from Eastern Indonesia are also well-represented in Pentecostal congregations in Java. As the thriving charismatic Christian movement puts more and more effort into redeeming millions of pribumi souls from various social strata, Pentecostalism appears as a new social force that has the potential to more broadly reshape ethnic relations. Indeed, the development of vibrant charismatic churches is part of an ongoing dissociation of ethnicity from religion in Indonesia. As domestic migration has de-territorialised ethnic groups and transnational media has facilitated varieties of lifestyles, the metropolitan churches in the cities prove more practical, and even liberating, than the parochial circles of traditional ethnic churches.

Although the majority of Pentecostal converts are former Protestants and Catholics, Muslim conversion to Pentecostalism is not unheard of. Christian proselytising among Muslims has long been a legal and social issue, leading to the creation of two decrees in the 1970s that forbid proselytising among those ‘who already have a religion’ or building worship facilities without a neighbourhood’s endorsement. Examples of peaceful co-existence among Christians and Muslims are abundant but there are, from time to time, conflicts and calls to shore up the boundaries between religious communities. For all its internal pluralism, exclusive tendencies within the charismatic community are also, alarmingly, perceptible. Some charismatic churches openly ridicule other religions and forbid members to date or marry non-Christians, while encouraging members to proselytise whenever possible. As such, it will not be an easy task for Indonesian Pentecostalism to develop a broader vision of its place in a religiously plural society.

A rewarding path to piety

Twenty-five-year-old Frances converted to Pentecostalism in the summer of 2009. She was born to an Indonesian Catholic family of Chinese-Dutch ancestry in Semarang and raised as a Catholic. During a cross-denominational charismatic retreat she attended that summer, she decided that she wanted to convert. When her parents and grandparents asked why she felt she had to change her religion, she told them that in the church she was attending now, her ‘spirituality would grow stronger’. Frances was one of a large contingent of mainline Protestants and Catholics who converted to Pentecostalism because of the more engaged spirituality it has offered them.

Charismatic Christianity provides a quick and rewarding path to deepen a pre-existing religious identity. Unlike the lengthy learning processes required to master Islamic recitation or complete training for Calvinist ministry, a person does not require formal training to become a Pentecostal preacher. Whoever is touched by the Holy Spirit can speak in tongues, heal the disabled, and become a spiritual leader.

The congregations of charismatic churches display ethnically pluralistic profiles En-Chieh Chao

In an environment of increasing Islamic public religiosity, the ease with which Pentecostalism allows its members to express their religiosity has been a compelling option for Christians. Even if some other Protestant and Catholic churches might offer a lively worship ambiance, Pentecostal churches have a feature that sets them apart for their followers, namely their relatively egalitarian and participatory leadership. The openness of Pentecostal leadership to lay men and women remains their unrivalled attraction to many followers.

These trends notwithstanding, it is too early to announce the decay of ethnic mainline churches. And while some mainline churches have incorporated limited elements of charismatic worship, many still cherish their own more solemn traditions. A third-year college student at Satya Wacana and a GKJ member told me in 2010 that she could not feel calm in a charismatic church. ‘Only in a quiet place like 55 [the nickname for the GKJ church building in front of the campus] can I feel God,’ she said. Similarly, a forty-five-year-old active participant in a GKJ congregation, who was also the head of his neighbourhood, lamented to me, ‘I can dance and cry like them [Pentecostals], too. The atmosphere there is exciting. But what about afterwards? Can we find God there?’ But for Frances and a growing number of Pentecostal converts, though, the answer is an unambiguous yes.

En-Chieh Chao (zolachao@gate.sinica.edu.tw) is a Post-Doctoral Research Fellow at the Center for Social Sciences and Humanities at Academia Sinica.

Rachelle Cole

The people have the right to free health care! A comic book published by KAJS

It’s International Labour Day 2011. A woman stands on the top of a truck parked outside the gates of the Presidential Palace and shouts into a megaphone: ‘LONG LIVE WORKERS!’ Thousands of enthusiastic protestors wave their union flags cheer her on. A mass of tangled barbed wire has been erected to prevent the protestors from entering the Palace gates. A police squad dressed in full riot gear stands guard nearby.

Since the democratic reforms which occurred after the fall of the end the New Order regime in 1998, scenes like this have become commonplace in Indonesia. You only need to spend one day in Jakarta to see a labour activist shouting into a megaphone at a rally. However, two things were different about this particular occasion. The person with the megaphone on May Day 2011 was not a labour activist – she was a member of the Lower House of Parliament (DPR). And the protest wasn’t about the minimum wage or working conditions – it was about a social security law that would affect all Indonesians.

This protest was part of the 2010-11 campaign for social security reform, driven by an alliance of 67 organisations called the Social Security Action Committee (KAJS). Working closely with politicians and targeting all Indonesians were two of the tactics that the trade unionists leading the campaign used most effectively. These tactics were the key to their success in this instance. They may also represent a shift in the way that the labour movement campaigns operate more broadly.

A campaign for all Indonesians

The genesis of the KAJS can be traced back to 9 March 2010, when a group of trade union leaders and labour activists met at the Treva Hotel in Jakarta to discuss social security reform. They were frustrated with the current state of social security for workers, which they believed to be ineffective and unfair. They were also fed up with the government’s lack of commitment to reform and by trade unionists’ inaction on this issue. The participants formed an alliance and launched a national campaign, which lasted for one and a half years. The primary focus of their campaign was the passing of the Social Security Providers Bill, which was required to give effect to reforms that had begun in the 2000s, but that had not resulted in any meaningful changes to the social security system.

One of the ways KAJS generated support was to sell their campaign to the general public. In the past, unions have tended to campaign narrowly for benefits for their members. But in this case they deliberately targeted the wider community. In the early stages of the campaign, KAJS leaders had pushed for reform of the law governing to JAMSOSTEK, the social security system for private-sector workers. But they soon changed tack.

When they began campaigning for a universal system they repositioned themselves as representing all Indonesians. They consistently referred to themselves as a ‘civil society alliance of unions, farmers, fisher people, and students’ that was campaigning for the rights of the ‘Indonesian people’. This inclusive approach broadened their appeal and attracted the support of other civil society organisations, the media and the general public, and ultimately underpinned the success of the campaign.

Not all trade unionists agreed with this strategy. Some union leaders criticised KAJS for its tactics, which they saw as betraying workers’ interests and moving away from the proper role for unions. A group of unions campaigning against KAJS rejected the Social Security Providers Bill because they believed it would disadvantage workers. This selfish approach didn’t win them any friends. As one leader actually acknowledged, his union’s narrow focus attracted nowhere near as much sympathy from the media as KAJS’ campaign for ‘all Indonesians’. KAJS leaders saw this counter campaign’s tactics as focusing on the ‘small picture’, as opposed to their own ‘big picture’ approach.

Political alliances

KAJS also forged partnerships with politicians, who were essential to the enactment of the Social Security Providers Bill. The most important of these was the alliance’s relationship with former soapie star, Rieke Dyah Pitaloka, from the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDIP). KAJS’ relationship with DPR members, and in particular with Rieke, was strategic for a number of reasons. Rieke participated in KAJS protests and other activities and also organised her own, which always attracted a large amount of media attention and lifted KAJS’ profile. She also facilitated KAJS’ lobbying activities by helping alliance members monitor parliamentary debates on the bill. She also informed them if the debates were moved from the DPR building to other locations, which often happens in the case of controversial bills in Indonesia.

But what was most important for the KAJS campaign was the lobbying conducted by the politicians themselves. Rieke was at the forefront of the efforts to further the progress of the Social Security Providers Bill in parliament. She argued for bill during hearings and expressed her disdain for the government for delaying its passage in the House and in the media. While she clearly had her own agenda, Rieke was also KAJS’ voice inside the DPR. She and other politicians used the popularity of the KAJS campaign to convince their colleagues of the bill’s merits, in the process, building their own profiles. In the final months of the campaign, only a few members of the government coalition were left blocking its passage.

Campaign success

The Social Security Providers Bill faced serious opposition from within the government, from employers and some elements of the labour movement. It’s very clear that without the campaign waged by KAJS, it would have at the very least been postponed until after the 2014 election. Instead, on 28 October 2011, Rieke and another DPR member emerged from the parliament building to announce to a large crowd of campaigners that the Social Security Providers Bill had finally become law.

In order to get this result, the KAJS union-led campaign adopted tactics that had not previously been used effectively by the labour movement. Their tactical toolkit – which also included more familiar tactics such as mass protest – was the key to getting the Social Security Providers Law passed. The success of the KAJS campaign shows how these new tactics and a broader vision can help the labour movement increase its bargaining power. It also demonstrates that parts of the labour movement are starting to take advantage of the democratic structures that were not available to it in the past. Indeed, the size and the effectiveness of the union-driven campaigns of the last three years has led activists and observers to argue that after ten years in the wilderness the labour movement is finally starting to assume a more powerful position in Indonesian society.

While the KAJS campaign formally ended after the Social Security Law was enacted, KAJS leaders have capitalised on the momentum generated by this successful outcome. They launched new coalitions and campaigns on social security and other issues in 2012. With their more robust tactical toolkit in place, chances are that their campaigns will succeed.

Rachelle Cole (rachellepetacole@gmail.com) recently completed Honours in Indonesian Studies at the University of Sydney.

Helene van Klinken

If you want to learn more about Timor Leste, Pat Walsh is well worth learning from. He has been passionately and fully engaged with East Timor since the invasion by Indonesia in 1975. The value of this anthology of writings lies in what we learn from the author’s perspective on many of the pressing issues facing East Timor. Initially I was a bit confused about how the ‘bits and pieces’ (poems, reflections, essays and reports) in his book fitted together, but gradually the picture came into focus. Reconciliation is a thread that runs throughout and is what spoke most to me.

For Walsh, recording the past and preserving the truth is essential for long-term reconciliation, and this book is part of his personal contribution to this end. With equal engagement he continues to work for the preservation of archives: in Timor-Leste he envisages a sort of ‘Timor Ark’ like ‘Noah’s biblical ark, to bring together material from a time of near extinction’; and he is currently assembling brochures, pamphlets, films from Australians, covering the same period.

Walsh’s commitment to reconciliation led to his involvement in setting up and advising the Commission for Reception, Truth and Reconciliation in East Timor (CAVR), 2001-2005; then with the Post CAVR Technical Secretariat, 2005-2010. Indeed this work crowns his life of activism and advocacy for human rights, a commitment that was acknowledged earlier this year when he received the Order of Australia (AM) in the Australia Day 2012 Honours Awards.

No foreigner is more passionate or knows more about the CAVR and its final report, Chega! than Pat Walsh. About one third of Scene of the Crime refers to the CAVR. However, it does not give an insider’s account or a detailed analysis; rather, the reader is given a taste of its essence by an authoritative connoisseur who brings the CAVR to life in an accessible way. This is useful as the full text of the original report runs to 3,500 pages. The information is presented as the scripts of presentations in various forums and also as private reflections with entries following a strictly chronological date of writing. Again reconciliation is highlighted.

In 2008, at Trinity College, Dublin, Walsh talked about the special status of reconciliation and the reference to the CAVR in the new constitution of the new country of Timor-Leste. It is unique in history and gives the CAVR the mission of contributing to the creation of a new society based on the ideals of reconciliation. In Melbourne in 2009, addressing the Parliament of the World’s Religions, Walsh pointed out that one reason Catholic East Timorese are able to understand reconciliation is because they relate it to the Catholic rite of confession.

Other texts offer insights into not only reconciliation but also tolerance, the need to address human rights abuses and impunity. From them we also learn much about the author. These texts are equally interesting for those who know Pat Walsh and those who don't, and for those familiar with East Timor and those who are not. They come in the form of personal stories, letters, poems, project ideas and proposals.

We get a glimpse of a man who, when he sees a need, responds concretely. On one occasion he and his wife Annie, were out walking when they came across a group of dislocated families. The leader of the group, Dominggos Monteiro, had dreamt the previous night that help to get new homes was on its way; a dream the couple of course generously and diligently helped to fulfil.

Walsh’s ideas and suggestions are all about helping to build and heal community. The steps needed for implementing the ideas are often worked out in the smallest detail. Rehabilitating the old Indonesian-era tennis courts was a particular passion. He thought back to the tennis courts in small country towns of his youth in Victoria. Every town had one and everyone was welcome—they created community. He has a well-thought-out list of challenges and an honour board of founding members. One idea which did not get up was his suggestion for a parallel Olympics in Dili, to be held at the same time as the Sydney Olympics in 2000. In his musings he outlined the rationale, budget, and a list of sports, including children’s games – marbles, kite-flying and pushing a tyre – a favourite game of Timorese kids. He even suggests a logo, a child running with a tyre, and not five but thirteen interlocking rings, one for each district!

Despite the fair amount of advice Walsh offers (such as to churches to stay out of politics), it is done in a spirit of humility, and deep respect for the Timorese shines through. The failure of the UN Transitional Administration, the governing authority until full independence in 2002, to include East Timorese in any significant way in decisions about the formation of their new administration caused him deep pain; as did the lack of resources it provided to its East Timor partner, the CNRT (National Council of Timorese Resistance), such as for its Baucau office.

He also respects Indonesians. He does not hesitate to take to task a few Australian friends for their careless, indeed misleading, references to Indonesians in their recent publications – concerned that such thoughtlessness will not help the process of reconciliation. It was his love for Indonesia and dedication to human rights in that country that led him to co-found this magazine in 1983. I am sure that Indonesian readers will respond warmly to the Indonesian translation of his book. On the cover is a photo Walsh took of a brilliant sunset looking west from Dili towards Indonesia, because the light there represents for him positive change in Indonesia towards East Timor. I found particularly intriguing a chapter about Abdurrahman Wahid (Gus Dur), who later became the first president after the end of the dictatorship. In the mid-1990s he visited Melbourne and Walsh describes guiding the almost blind Gus Dur over uneven Melbourne footpaths to clandestine meetings to discuss ways to resolve the impasse in East Timor.

The book is peppered with Walsh’s wry sense of humour. He wanted to give a packet of cigarettes to Father Peter, his prospective host when he first went to Dili in 2002, but the horrific warnings of the dangers of smoking on the boxes available in Darwin airport were rather off-putting – he settled on one with the warning, ‘smoking when pregnant harms your baby,’ as the least detrimental to his celibate mate!

Hope

The author’s small selection of poetry which ends the book gives us a glimpse of the source of hope and deep spirituality that drives this remarkable man. Themes include empathy, wonder and re-birth: on reflecting in a dark place, ‘the mind is unhitched to gallop and frolic like a pup’; on a refreshing swim in the beach off Dili, he is ‘carried away from the hurting land to float under ploughed paddocks of snow’; on contemplating the image of a young girl, ‘Number 9,’ in the Tuol Sleng museum in Phnom Penh, ‘I expect to relate and understand, but dumbstruck I have nothing for you … Number 9...what should we do to make up to you?’

The book ends with the poem 'Walking up Golgotha', a challenging climb following the Stations of the Cross up the hill called ‘Golgotha’ near the author’s home in Dili. He likens this climb, which ‘squeezes out sweat like blood’, to the struggle of the Timorese to reach their land of hope, while stretched out below is the ‘scene of the crime’. At the end of the book I felt that I too had been on a journey. He helped me to look with different eyes and a changed heart at the scene below. In relation to Timor-Leste, political analysis can be depressing, economic and social statistics bleak; this book gave me a different way of thinking about commitment to truth and reconciliation. It was deeply moving, and inspired hope.

Pat Walsh, At the Scene of the Crime: Essays, reflections and poetry on East Timor, 1999-2010, Mosaic Publishing, Northcote Vic., 2012. It is also available in Indonesian, Di Tempat Kejadian Perkara: Tulisan, refleksi, dan puisi tentang Timor-Leste, 1999-2010, Kepustakaan Populer Gramedia, Jakarta, 2012. For updates on Timor and Indonesia you can also visit Pat's website, www.patwalsh.net.

Helene van Klinken (helenevk@gmail.com) volunteered briefly at the CAVR in 2003 and is the author of Making them Indonesians: Child transfers out of East Timor, Clayton Vic., Monash University Publishing, 2011.

Dave McRae

Indonesia's National Narcotics Board advocates the death penalty for narcotics crimes, Dave McRae

Surveying the death penalty in 2008 for Inside Indonesia, I concluded that there was little prospect that Indonesia would abolish capital punishment. Executions had peaked in 2008, with ten in a single year – almost half the total number conducted since the fall of Suharto. Imminent elections also seemed to suggest more of Indonesia's 100-odd death row prisoners could soon be brought before firing squads. Meanwhile, the Constitutional Court had eschewed two chances to repeal death penalty statutes, finding neither the death penalty for narcotics crimes nor firing squads as a method of execution to violate the constitution's bill of rights.

Since then, however, Indonesia's stance on capital punishment has shifted. After the 2008 peak, Indonesia has conducted no executions at all. Courts have also started to hand down fewer death sentences, with the decrease clearest for narcotics-related crimes. Most significantly, Indonesian president Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono decided to grant clemency to four people on death row for narcotic offences in 2011 and 2012, reducing their sentences to life imprisonment. These decisions constitute a clear departure from previous government policy and rhetoric. Beforehand, there had been only one known case of clemency for a capital offence in the past 30 years.

What is driving these changes, and are they the first steps along the path to abolition? Unexpectedly, it has been the execution of an Indonesian overseas that has newly energised Indonesia's abolitionists.

Momentum for abolition

Indonesia has always had a small but committed abolitionist movement. But they have struggled to make headway in the face of majority public support for the death penalty, reinforced by vocal conservatives. Over the past 18 months, though, the Indonesian government has advocated strenuously for Indonesians facing execution overseas, whatever their crime may be. The contrast between blanket representations for clemency abroad and continued application of the death penalty at home has become increasingly hard to ignore. The imperative to protect Indonesian citizens abroad has also allowed abolitionists to make a pragmatic case to end capital punishment.

But although this issue has done the most to shift Indonesia's position, it is not the only factor. The death penalty also impedes Indonesia's cooperation with other countries around extradition and the recovery of assets, to the frustration of some law enforcement officials, including Indonesia's deputy attorney general for special crimes. Civil servants responsible for carrying out executions have also expressed their distaste for the task. Prosecutors from the Attorney General's department administer executions, from informing the condemned prisoner three days prior to their execution, to receiving any last requests or statements, giving the order to the police firing squad to commence the execution, and observing the prisoner's body to confirm death. A prosecutor, speaking in a personal capacity, indicated that several officials within the department would prefer that no executions happen during their term. Notably, Attorney General Basrief Arief also reportedly recommended that the president grant clemency to Meirika Franola, who was on death row for a narcotics offence.

More speculatively, President Yudhoyono may see steering Indonesia towards abolition as a chance to boost Indonesia's international human rights reputation deep into his second and final presidential term. Some Indonesian activists perceive that Yudhoyono's support for the death penalty was one reason he was overlooked for the 2008 Nobel Peace Prize for the Aceh peace process. There is speculation that Yudhoyono aspires to the post of UN Secretary General in 2016: a reputation for frequent executions would count against him there, too.

None of these factors though lend impetus to abolition to the same degree as the government's obligation to protect Indonesians facing the death penalty abroad. This has been a searing foreign policy hot potato for the Indonesian government, ever since the execution of Indonesian domestic worker Ruyati binti Satubi in Saudi Arabia in mid-2011. Executed for stabbing her employer to death, Ruyati's case generated an uproar in Indonesia, where it is recognised that such murders are often the consequence of maltreatment of Indonesian maids by foreign employers. Many Indonesians felt that the government had done little to assist Ruyati. The resultant outcry has put intense pressure on the government to prevent any further executions.

Reconciling foreign and domestic policy

Soon after Ruyati's case, the government established a taskforce of officials and private citizens to establish protections for Indonesian citizens facing the death penalty abroad. The taskforce pursued diplomatic measures, such as President Yudhoyono writing personally in support of clemency, as well as legal approaches, including the establishment of a network of lawyers on retainer in priority countries. The government also took the extraordinary step of paying blood money to free several Indonesians facing execution for murder in Saudi Arabia. The taskforce was disbanded after a year, but this intensive diplomacy has continued. The government is presently negotiating a blood money payment for another domestic worker in Saudi Arabia, for example. In all, the government claims to have helped 110 Indonesians avoid the death penalty abroad, including securing the release of 33 individuals to return to Indonesia.

The Indonesian government has also turned to this foreign advocacy each time it has come under fire for granting clemency to narcotics prisoners within Indonesia. This has proven to be a potent argument. In one example, government death penalty taskforce spokesperson Humphrey R. Djemat suggested on a television talk show that if people wanted to criticise the government as soft on drugs for granting clemency to Australian narcotics convict Schapelle Corby, they should also have criticised the government when it gained clemency for Indonesian drug convicts overseas. The camera then panned straight to prominent government critic Yusril Ihza Mahendra, showing him sullen-faced with his eyes fixed firmly on the table in front of him.

When critics subsequently attacked the government over the death penalty clemency decisions, Indonesian Foreign Minister Marty Natalegawa waded into the debate, again drawing explicit links between foreign advocacy and domestic policy. Natalegawa reminded Indonesians that 42 of the 100 Indonesians to escape the death penalty abroad at that point had faced narcotics charges. 'So, if we discuss narcotics crimes and the granting of clemency domestically,' Republika Online reported Natalegawa saying, 'we also must remember that overseas 45 per cent of Indonesians are facing the death penalty [for narcotics crimes].' In the same press conference, Natalegawa also reportedly cited an international trend toward abolition, saying 'Indonesia itself is already headed in that direction.'

Significant opposition remains

President Yudhoyono's decision to grant clemency to four narcotics prisoners has been the strongest public indication to date of a shift in the Indonesian government's position on the death penalty. Predictably, given that polling suggests strong public support for its continuation, the decision has been controversial. Public figures lined up to criticise the clemency decisions, from politicians, to the Constitutional Court chief justice, as well as religious leaders. The strongest reaction though came from the National Narcotics Board, universally known by its acronym BNN. The agency has long advocated stern penalties for narcotics crimes. General Gories Mere, BNN head from 2009 until his retirement in December 2012, repeatedly drew attention to the availability of the death penalty for possession of as little as five grams of drugs, and criticised the courts for not handing down the death penalty more often. His statements seemed to gain little traction, though, until the clemency decisions gave BNN its chance to act.

One of the narcotics prisoners to receive clemency was Meirika Franola, originally sentenced to death in 2000. Shortly after her clemency decision became public, (more than a year after Yudhoyono had handed down the decision), BNN arrested Franola at the Tangerang women's prison. BNN depicted Franola as a high-level player in a drug syndicate spanning several prisons, led by Nigerian Hillary Chimezie. The arrests were a major embarrassment to the government, spurring accusations of carelessness and naivety, and even that drug syndicates had infiltrated the president's ring of advisors.

Franola's arrest led to calls to revoke her clemency and reimpose the death penalty, an extraordinary extrajudicial step that the government nevertheless initially appeared to consider. BNN claimed that the arrest was not politically motivated; that her name had merely cropped up by chance during the investigation of an Indonesian drug courier arrested in Bandung. However the case came to their attention, BNN clearly utilised this case as a way to drive forward their broader political agenda.

Whither the death penalty

Four years without an execution, the clemency decisions, Natalegawa's statement and the ongoing pressure to protect citizens abroad are all cause for more optimism now than in recent times that Indonesia will end capital punishment. Belying these positive signs of a move towards abolition, the courts handed down at least 11 death sentences in 2012, bringing the total number of prisoners on death row to 133 people by Attorney-General's Department figures, with at least one further death sentence since. Of particular concern, the Indonesian Attorney-General also announced that eight prisoners were to be executed, with the Deputy Attorney-General for General Crimes saying executions must take place in 2013.

Such announcements have come and gone before without leading to executions, and may do so again this time. But for the moment at least, Indonesia remains a country that opposes the death penalty for its own citizens abroad but continues to apply capital punishment within its own borders.

Dave McRae (dmcrae@lowyinstitute.org) is a research fellow in the East Asia Program at the Lowy Institute for International Policy and a member of the Inside Indonesia editorial committee. His report A Key Domino: Indonesia's Death Penalty Politics is available for download.

Jemma Purdey and Thushara Dibley

The first edition featuring Gen. Benny Murdani, November 1983

This year Inside Indonesia celebrates its 30th anniversary. It is a wonderful milestone, no doubt unforeseen by founders Pat Walsh and John Waddingham when they published its first edition, with Max Lane in the editor’s chair, in November 1983. Since then 111 quarterly editions of Inside Indonesia have been published and, since going completely online in 2007, new articles also appear weekly.

As it was in the beginning, so the vision and mission of Inside Indonesia remains today; a commitment to raising awareness about the diversity of Indonesian society, and about the struggles of those Indonesians who aim to achieve greater democracy, human rights, gender and racial equality, tolerance and environmental sustainability. We do this by publishing high-quality articles by experts, researchers and practitioners in the field. Some things, however, have changed, not least of these the end of the New Order’s autocratic rule in whose midst the magazine was born, replaced by a largely stable albeit flawed democracy.

Our readership has changed too…and also stayed the same. Many of the subscribers to the printed magazine in the 1980s and 1990s are now among the 3500 subscribers receiving the e-magazine in their inboxes and reading it on their tablets and smartphones. The biggest change however, is in the demographic of our readership. Where once Inside Indonesia needed to be posted to subscribers in Indonesia in unmarked brown envelopes and where one copy was passed around from reader to reader, today the largest percentage of our readers are indeed inside Indonesia – over 20 per cent, just a fraction larger than our Australian readership, followed by the United States and then the rest of the world. Our readers follow us on Facebook and Twitter and through these and other channels the Inside Indonesia website receives between 3000-4000 visitors a week.

Over the coming year we will be publishing a series of articles to celebrate all of those people who have helped sustain Inside Indonesia until today. This series will document some of the key events and memories which have been part of the magazine’s history, contemplate how things have changed since Inside Indonesia began and reflect on the role the magazine may play into the future. This series of articles, written by the movers and shakers of Inside Indonesia over these 30 years, will also consider the changing impact on the magazine of issues including the Australia-Indonesia bilateral relationship, Timor Leste, media freedoms, political reform and much more. Throughout 2013 we will also delve into the Inside Indonesia archive to bring you some of the best articles, interviews and reviews from across the decades.

As we launch into our series of articles, we hope that you, our valued readers, will also participate in celebrating the achievements of Inside Indonesia with us. Please feel free to share our articles on Facebook, Tweet about what is written or leave a comment on the articles. We are also planning a celebration event in Melbourne later in the year – watch this space. All will be most welcome!

Finally, we need to acknowledge the central role that our volunteers, contributors and readers have played in cultivating and sustaining Inside Indonesia over the years. The magazine operates entirely on voluntary labour and is funded primarily by donations. Without our core group of editors, web managers, those who take the time to write and, of course without our valued readers, Inside Indonesia would simply not exist. Thank you to everyone who has helped make the magazine what it is – we look forward to celebrating our 30th anniversary year with you.

Selamat membaca!

Jemma Purdey (jepurdey@hotmail.com) is Chair of the Inside Indonesia Board; Thushara Dibley (thushdibley@gmail.com) is a Board member, editor and web manager for Inside Indonesia.

Bobby Anderson

The view flying out of Sinolka, Bobby Anderson

To many an outsider, the indigenous population of Papua constitutes one people of uniform identity and culture. The opposite is true: Papua’s continuous fragmentation along tribal and clan lines has resulted in 312 tribes (according to official figures), thousands of clans, and a minimum of 269 indigenous languages. The area is one of the most linguistically diverse in the world. It is also riven with internal conflicts, many of which take a violent form and which result in the constant formation of new clans - the primary marker of identity in the region.

The product of these contentious collective relationships, and a history of both constant war between clans and shifting and unpredictable allegiances within clans, is small, isolated populations spread across rugged topography, settled in defensible areas that are distant from other settlements. Such wars have lessened over time, but the isolation remains.

Now, in a new era of more democratic government, many of the isolated and remote communities that have arisen as a result of this historical pattern of settlement in Papua are demanding health, education, and other services. In many of the more isolated areas, however, local governments are not able to respond to these demands. This is especially true in new districts created under decentralisation, which lack the capacity to maintain health and education services in district capitals, much less peripheral areas. One product of the new demands is a fury of runway construction in remote communities, whose people often unrealistically hope that runways will bring in the services they crave. The isolation that used to be a blessing an in era of inter-clan conflict has become a curse in an era of state-building and service delivery.

Education and health in a remote valley

The village of Sinokla, in Soloikma subdistrict, is illustrative of these isolated areas. It is one of the most remote, and poorest, parts of Indonesia. Sinokla lies in the new district of Yahukimo, in the Papuan highlands. Its only fast connection to the outside world is its airstrip, which is half overgrown with weeds and barely usable. Travel by foot to Dekai or Wamena takes five days to the former and seven days to the latter: trails do not exist, and navigation occurs by one’s knowledge of the peaks and valleys surrounding Sinokla. The Seng River, which flows south to the lowlands and Dekai, and eventually, the Arafura Sea, is too wild to be navigable.

The far-flung settlements of the Sinokla area are located far from the river due to erosion and avalanches that have undermined past settlements and killed villagers. Unlike most other human settlements in the highlands, which are situated in more defensible areas high in the Jayawijaya and Sudirman mountain ranges (usually at over 2,000 metres), Sinokla’s settlements lie so deep in a narrow valley that pilots cannot attempt landings too early in the morning, as the valley is still dark when the rest of the area is light.

The airstrip at Sinolka, Bobby Anderson

Unlike Lolat (profiled in my earlier Inside Indonesia article, 'Living without a state', where rudimentary health and education services are available, Sinokla has never had health services: no health centre (Puskesmas), no cadres or maternal and child health services (Posyandu). The nearest place where Sinokla’s people can access health care is in Lolat, where Yasumat, a local NGO, provides services. Lolat is two days’ walk from Sinokla. Planes are not an option for medical emergencies: they land once a month on average. Medical emergencies result in recovery, handicap, or death, unaffected by treatment.

Sinokla has a school, built of stone, where one teacher instructs primary school children for free. That teacher is not fully literate; he teaches what he remembers. He is not a state employee; he has never been paid. Everyone possesses one set of clothing, all of it in varying stages of decomposition. Children’s bellies are so distended as to look painfully pregnant, the result of Kwashiorkor as well as intestinal parasites: their arms and legs are just as spindly as their bellies are stretched. Even the church—usually the grandest building in a settlement—is made of bamboo, with no walls and no floor. There is not a single zinc roof or pane of glass (or even plastic sheeting) in the area. Nor, when I last visited, was there a single bar of soap or toothbrush or anything related to hygiene. And the lack of assets, usually kept in the highlands in the form of livestock, is shocking. On a recent visit to Sinokla, I saw only one young pig, and one dog.

The villagers of Sinokla have plenty of requests that they express to rare visitors, and plenty of ideas about how to develop the area. They ask for the airstrip to be graded, for a health centre to be built, and for a house for a teacher that they would then secure from Dekai. They ask for water systems for their villages: living far from the Seng River lets them sleep easier but their women still must walk every day to it for water. They even ask for mosquito foggers.

The curse of remoteness

But what Sinokla’s people want, right now, is not feasible. The isolation of Sinokla is simply not compatible with the provision of services there: it is too remote and its population is too small. Exile and distance between settlements once served an important role in an older Papua, a place that was riven by continuous local wars fuelled by the aspirations of emerging leaders, where education was only how to care for pigs or maintain a garden, and where one’s health was controlled by one’s interaction with an otherworldly domain of ancestors and spirits. These remote settlements were self-sufficient, even autarchic.

Sinokla existed because of such conflicts: one local mentioned that Sinokla’s people were originally from a higher altitude, near Lolat, but left a few generations before. Whether they were on the losing side of a clan war or some other conflict that led to displacement is not known. But the poor soil and threat from the Seng River and the hills it disintegrates all point to the conclusion that Sinokla’s people are not there by choice. And this isolation is now an impediment to the things that people desire from modernity.

To simply say that Papua has a rugged topography is to under-represent the challenge, not just of service delivery, but of movement in the highlands and in much of the coast. Papua and the neighbouring province of Papua Barat cover an area the size of California, and yet were hardly penetrated by outsiders until the last century. When the Dutch sought to create a presence in order to more robustly stake a claim to the territory, they established a bare-bones presence in Manokwari, Hollandia (Jayapura), and Merauke, and even that was largely through proxies from Maluku. Papua’s interior remained a place of legend to within living memory, with the exception of incursions to places like Boven Digoel, which served only as a place of exile for political prisoners.

Papua’s coast is distinguished by swamps and alluvial plains that transform into the foothills of a mountain range that bisects the territory and essentially cuts off the north from the south in the same way that the Hindu Kush leaves Afghanistan as two entities. The highlands are not simply a geographic line in this bisection: they are the interior in its entirety. The swamps and jungles that separate them from the coast served to deter all penetration by foot, while the sight of the mountains from the coast deterred later attempts by plane: the highlands include roughly ten peaks that stand higher than 4,000 metres, of which Puncak Jaya, Mandala, and Trikora are the most famous.

The rivers running from these mountains create deltas hundreds of miles across and they saturate the lowlands. These mountains host small glaciers and snow and the lower peaks are subject to frost regularly. To the north and west, the peaks range between 1,000 and 3,000 metres. Those mountains were an effective psychological deterrent until a lost pilot crested the northern peaks of the Baliem Valley in 1938 and, where maps indicated peaks, he saw human settlements. That valley hosted an organised civilization compared to the settlements concealed within the folds of the massifs surrounding it. What once had appeared to be an endless mass of rocks and trees was also a mass of clans and extended families. As often as not they were at war with one another, forming a human landscape just as volatile and subject to erosion and tension as the mountains themselves.

A new airstrip in Yahukimo, Bobby Anderson

A history of contact

It was not until the 1950s that foreign missionaries penetrated the highlands. The 1970s and 1980s were marked by numerous instances of first contact with clans throughout those mountains. Even today, the challenges of the area remain. This is a landscape of gorges, slim valleys, high peaks, and foot trails. There is no ordinary Indonesian concept of seasons in the mountains: there is the rainy season, and then there is the more rainy season. No roads connect the coast to the highlands, everything goes in by plane, to Wamena, Mulia, Oxibil, and a few other gritty little frontier towns that host large paved airstrips. And those are just the towns that are easy to reach: there are hundreds of other settlements, some with airstrips, most without. Questions of service delivery in these areas, therefore, are questions of logistics.

This isolation has had an impact upon highland physiology. When highlanders or lowland forest dwellers report that it takes a day to walk somewhere, the pace that is the basis of their estimation is a Papuan base. I am an avid hiker, but I find that these estimates have to be increased by an average factor of three for a non-Papuan walker. Highland women and children walk for days without a second thought across areas that many a soldier would find impenetrable (this stamina among highland populations is one of the reasons why Papuan recruits are so in demand in Kopassus and other Indonesian elite military units). Highlanders in transit live off the land for days, moving at a light jog for 12 hours or more on bare feet, on trails that untrained eyes can barely discern, eating sugarcane stalks and sleeping rough. Such distances beg the question: where is there room for services, outside the airstrips, across terrain such as this? And what happens when there is a complication to a pregnancy or some other medical emergency in an area with no airstrip?

Sinokla, then, is hardly unique in its isolation. It is lucky in that it has an airstrip. In Yahukimo district, outside of handful of larger population centres and more frequented airstrips, there exist hundreds of places like Sinokla, but with no connections to the outside other than by foot. Yahukimo’s settlements also exist in economic bubbles where little, if any, trade occurs between settlements. Money is not exchanged for local goods and services, and areas do not specialise in the production of particular products. That these areas remain habitually autarchic is a result of their isolation, and also, their past wars between clans, when the trails between villages of different clans were purposefully destroyed and every man went about armed.

This pattern of conflict continues: in 2011 when I visited Nalca, another village in Yahukimo, a war between villages had resulted in a freezing of movement and the destruction of trails. Every boy and man was armed. In another clan war in Tolikara in 2011, the death of a girl was blamed on witchcraft by another clan and nearly two dozen people were killed (including a priest who tried to mediate) before the matter was settled by an exchange of pigs, mediated by TNI soldiers from a nearby post.

In such volatile environments, communities typically consume only what they produce, except for a few recently-adopted products like rice, fuel, cooking oil, clothing, and refined sugar that are manufactured outside and flown in. The further one travels from frequently used airstrips, the less one encounters such products: in Sinokla, there are no outside products for sale or trade. The only products flowing out of these areas as trade goods are such items as black orchids and rare birds killed for their feathers. Even Dekai, the district capital is in a rudimentary economic state: it does not even have permanent banking services.

An absent state

In Yahukimo’s larger settlements, government health and education do not function. The abovementioned NGO, Yasumat, provides some services in these areas. Critics who would seek to blame the central government or the province for the lack of services should note that, since decentralisation was first implemented about a decade ago, the real authority for such services lies at the district level. But Yahukimo has so many contending political allegiances that the civil servant rolls are filled with political appointees from the clans that the district head (bupati) requires the support of for other initiatives. Services take second place to these appointments, and the Yahukimo government is not managing to provide services outside of Dekai. The services available in Dekai itself are often poor.

This political shelf-stocking of civil servants in order to maintain allegiances is also connected to a collective misinterpretation of the affirmative action policies articulated in the special autonomy legislation under which Papua is now governed. Many civil servants do not interpret their positions as the positions of persons who play a role in service delivery for their own people. Rather, the perception is that the position, and the salary, is what is owed to them by the government as an individual benefit from the proceeds of Papua’s mineral wealth.

Service mapping conducted in Nalca, Lolat, Holowan and Soba subdistricts reveals nothing but YASUMAT services. In Sinokla, there is nothing to map. The churches are the one institution that exist in through the area and that possess a bureaucratic structure and offers regular services, and these only concern themselves with ecclesiastical matters.

Kids outside school at Sinolka, Bobby Anderson

Sinokla’s people say they want to bring their area up to the level of Lolat or Ninia, which have benefitted from much more infrastructural (but not human resources) development from the district government. This is why Sinokla’s airstrip, long neglected, is being maintained again.

This airstrip construction is part of a much larger trend in the highlands: within the last five years close to 80 new airstrips have been built in Yahukimo alone. These airstrips are constructed by community labour, by people who want more services and greater access to the outside world. One could say it is a building boom fuelled by hope. However, the main airline that can service small airstrips in the highlands, Mission Aviation Fellowship (MAF), does not have a fleet large enough to service more than a very small number of these airstrips. Other airlines with the ability to land on short runways, such as Tariku, AMA, and Yajasi, cannot fly to areas where the service is not economically viable.

This building trend is also emblematic of clan rivalries. Clans with airstrips on ‘their’ land either exclude members of enemy clans from using those airstrips, or they levy exorbitant fees on them.

However, providing modern services by necessity requires any government to prioritise some areas over others. If and when health and education services in Yahukimo improve, it inevitably will be the main population centres that reap the benefit. Dekai will grow first, partly as a result of an increasing migrant population entering that town in anticipation of a future building boom, fuelled by coal discoveries in the foothills. Ninia will follow; shortly after will come Lolat, Holowan, Soba, and others. Luckily for these places, YASUMAT is working on service provision there, and the Yahukimo government is preparing to put the NGO’s teachers on the government payroll, effectively acknowledging the government’s own limitations and the quality of YASUMAT’s services.

Sinokla and similarly tiny, remote settlements will be last in line. The isolation of Sinokla’s people makes the provision of quality services to them all but impossible for a society with such rudimentary government structures. The citizens of Sinokla seem to know this. The people with ambition have all left. Even the village head is undertaking a law degree in the University of Cenderawasih in the provincial capital, paid by the Yahukimo district government. The population will continue to decline, and eventually, the place will be a memory.

Bobby Anderson (rubashov@yahoo.com) works on health, education, and governance projects in Eastern Indonesia, and he travels frequently in Papua province.

Maesy Angelina and Ben Davis

Presidential hopeful Rhoma Irama, Agung Setiawan

It seems not a week goes by when we don’t hear that Indonesia is at a crossroads. The usual story goes that Indonesia has negotiated a successful transition to democracy, but has a few kinks to be ironed out if it is to continue to prosper and consolidate itself as a mature democracy.

The election of Joko Widodo (Jokowi) and Basuki Tjahja Purnama (Ahok) as Jakarta’s governor and vice governor and the entry of a series of other independent candidates to the political realm bring positive prospects for Indonesia’s future. At the same time, on a national scale, the lack of accountability for political parties, increasing cases of religious intolerance and ongoing corruption scandals involving elected officials continue to mar the rosy picture of Indonesian democracy.

With limited political accountability, popularity is a key asset for aspiring members of local and national parliaments alike. Recognising the public’s disenchantment with the current political system, political parties are increasingly going out of their way to source candidates outside the party machine. The success rate for independent candidates in getting political party support in the presidential race is zero so far. But recent trends suggest we can expect to see more independent candidates. The fact that Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono is due to hang up his hat in 2014 also improves prospects for outsiders.

Enter Rhoma Irama: infamous dangdut star turned preacher; former People’s Representative Assembly (MPR) member for Golkar, and polygamist, who announced his self-nomination for the 2014 Presidential election on 11 November 2012.

From dangdut king to presidential hopeful

Rhoma Irama, born Raden Irama in the Tasikmalaya region of West Java in 1946, has been a controversial public figure in Indonesia for the past five decades.

Affectionately known as Bang Haji, Rhoma made his public debut as a musician in the Malay orchestra genre in the late 1960s. He later shifted to dangdut, an Indonesian music genre influenced by Hindi, Malay, and Arabic music, where he made his mark by including moral and religious messages in his songs. While sporting Western rock-and-roll inspired attire, he sang against extra-marital sex, corruption, drugs, and gambling. He put his money where his mouth was by kicking out band members who consumed alcohol or had extra-marital sex. This proved to be a popular move. He went on to produce 57 albums and star in 25 movies, which earned him the title ‘king of dangdut’.

Rhoma’s popularity prompted political parties to woo him into supporting their campaigns. Rhoma chose to side with the Islamic United Development Party (PPP) from 1977 to 1982, angering the ruling party, Golkar. As a consequence, he was banned from performing on the government national TV station, TVRI, for a decade. Rhoma severed his alliance to PPP in the late 1980s, but then made a re-appearance as a member of the People’s Representative Assembly (MPR) for Golkar in 1992 to 1997.

Rhoma again stepped out of the limelight in the 2000s, focusing on his duties as a preacher. His polygamous marriage, extra marital affairs with younger dangdut singers, and his condemnation of Inul Daratista, a dangdut singer who shot to fame with her gyrating moves, calling her a disgrace to Islam, occasionally made tabloid headlines. The latter made national news and fuelled debate on the concept of ‘porno-action’ that eventually made its way to the contentious 2008 Pornography Law.

In 2012, Rhoma made national headlines by stating that Jakartans should not vote for leaders who are not Muslim, an explicit reference to Ahok, Jokowi’s Christian running mate, who is also ethnic Chinese. He was then called in for questioning by the Jakarta Election Supervisory Committee on the grounds that he had violated a regulation prohibiting political campaigning in places of worship, though he was found not guilty of the charges. Rhoma declared his willingness to become a presidential candidate on 11 November 2012, stating that he was ‘called’ to do so upon seeing the anxiety of many Muslims after a ‘certain ethnic group’ won the gubernatorial election in Jakarta.

Popularity for popularity’s sake?

Analysts have had trouble taking Rhoma seriously. Burhanuddin Muhtadi, a senior researcher at Lembaga Survei Indonesia, dismissed Rhoma’s self-nomination, suggesting that it should be treated as joke of the month. This response has been echoed by many Indonesian social media users. Within a few days, a satirical support group for Rhoma called SPERMA (Rhoma Irama’s Supporters’ Association) popped up on Facebook. The Twittersphere erupted with jokes, and videos of Metallica and Guns and Roses lip-syncing to Rhoma’s most popular songs went viral. After all, in addition to his notorious track record, this is a guy who stated in an interview on national television that a president is not required to have a political opinion on important issues because a ‘brain trust’ of experts is available to advise him.

Surely someone who intends to run for president but doesn’t have anything to say on contentious public issues like fuel subsidy will not gain support from the public nor political parties? Don’t look now, but Rhoma might actually gain such support. Two political parties are reportedly seriously considering Rhoma as their presidential candidate. The head of the National Awakening Party (PKB), the party associated with former president Gus Dur, had a meeting with Rhoma to discuss a possible partnership. Romahurmuzy, the Secretary General of PPP, has also announced that his party will include Rhoma in the electability survey used to determine its presidential candidates.

Rhoma’s candidacy also has significant public support. In addition to his official fan club, Rhoma is supported by the Wasiat Ulama Association and the Indonesia Malay Musicians Association. A mass based organisation called Betawi Cengkareng also put up a ‘Rhoma Irama for President’ poster in Kemanggisan. In obvious references to other possible presidential candidates, Prabowo and Aburizal Bakrie, a blogger at Kompasiana argued that a Rhoma presidency is a better option than electing a person responsible for mass human rights violations in Timor Leste or someone whose company was responsible for the biggest man-made disaster in Indonesia. Rhoma also appeals to elements of the Islamic constituency. As another blogger simply wrote, ‘Best wishes for your struggle to bring Indonesia back to the true Islamic values, Bang Haji. My prayers are with you.’

In short, the Rhoma Irama saga shows that popularity remains a key factor in Indonesia’s political parties’ consideration of presidential candidates. It might appear that Indonesian legislatures are now over-run by celebrities. A closer look reveals, however, that celebrities actually only hold 3 per cent of seats in the People’s Representative Council (DPR). This suggests that, in terms of electability, there is a difference between simply being known by the public and being known as a good political candidate. This interpretation is supported by Bill Liddle’s analysis, which has shown a shift of Indonesian voting choices from mostly voting based on charisma in 1999 and 2004 elections to increased consideration of the state of the economy and performance of the incumbent in 2009. Meanwhile, surveys conducted by Lembaga Survey Indonesia (LSI) and the Center for Political Studies in the University of Indonesia (Puskapol UI) reveal that while the ethnic and religious background of candidates still plays a role in voter choices, it is not the only factor, and perhaps no longer even the most important. In fact, Puskapol UI’s survey showed that the 66.9 per cent of respondents based their vote on the quality of a candidate’s program. These findings suggest that the successful candidates in the upcoming election will be the ones whose popularity is complemented by a strong record of political leadership experience, rather than just popularity for popularity’s sake.

The good, the bad – and the bizarre

It is easy to dwell on the absurdity of Rhoma Irama’s possible presidential candidacy. But the saga actually contains an important story about the health of Indonesia’s democracy. After all, democracy does bring with it the good and the bad. Rhoma’s case reminds us that everyone has the same right to be a presidential candidate. A healthy democracy like Indonesia’s makes way for the quirky, the popular and the bizarre. Indonesia isn’t alone in this – after all, the US has the Tea Party and Sarah Palin.

But Indonesia’s recent political history also hints that, in the long run, weak candidates who use cheap political tricks will be less successful than candidates with a strong and relevant track record. Rhoma’s attempts to derail the Jakarta gubernatorial elections in 2012 through cheap inflammatory comments about governor candidates Ahok and Jokowi simply didn’t resonate with Jakarta voters. The survey results further attest to this and suggest that these sorts of comments are no longer welcome across Indonesia.

And so the soap opera remains unfinished. One thing is for sure, though: Jakarta’s 2012 gubernatorial election showed that popularity based on image is not the only key to winning. Let’s hope that this trend continues.

Maesy Angelina (maesy.angelina@gmail.com) and Ben Davis (beno_di_indo@yahoo.co.id) are development workers based in Jakarta. Maesy holds a MA on Development Studies with a focus on Youth Studies from the International Institute of Social Studies – University of Rotterdam in 2010. Ben graduated with first class Honours from the University of Sydney in 2007, having completed a thesis on Indonesian NGO activism.

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Sharyn Graham Davies, Adrianus Meliala and John Buttle

A Friend and Partner of Society, John Buttle

It is no secret that Indonesia’s police force needs a face lift. Public opinion overwhelmingly depicts Indonesia’s police force (Polri) as corrupt, brutal, and inept. And public opinion is not wrong. Corruption within Polri is rampant and in some instances institutionalised. Human rights abuses inflicted by police officers are common media stories, especially in relation to conflict zones such as Papua and Poso. Stories abound of instances where police officers have demanded payment before investigating a case, or of officers abusing victims of crime, particularly sex workers. Even in instances where police do seriously investigate a crime, a lack of sufficient training and operational funding mean that, despite their best intentions, the crime is often not solved.

But Polri have recognised their shortcomings and, particularly at upper management level, there is a real desire to improve their image. Their strategy for achieving these aims does not rely on brains or brawn, though. Rather, it relies on beauty.

Policing or entertainment?

Jakartans are all too familiar with Eny Regama, Avvy Olivia Atam, and Eka Yulianti, the three police officers that present traffic reports on television. Every night, one of these policewomen appears on screen advising commuters on the quickest route into the centre of Jakarta, or updating viewers on any roads works or traffic accidents. The reports are streamed live from police headquarters and the presenters are dressed in their uniforms. These young women also sport fashionable bob haircuts and make-up that is neither too subtle nor too outlandish. Indeed, these officers present just the right mix of sexiness and seriousness to win viewers over.

This trio is just one of Polri’s secret weapons in its attempt to establish trust and rapport with the public. Polri has also made concerted efforts, and indeed passed regulations, to (literally) position policewomen as front line defenders against rowdy protest groups. In March 2012, demonstrations were organised throughout the country to protest the rise in the price of basic commodities, especially fuel. In response to planned mass protests, 33,000 police and military personnel were deployed nationwide. As an additional crowd control tactic, Jakarta police mobilised two platoons of unarmed policewomen reportedly trained in the psychology of potentially dangerous mobs.

Not only had these policewomen undergone months of training in negotiation and communication, but also they had an additional special weapon: dance moves that would appease angry crowds. Faced with an angry mob, policewomen were positioned on the front line of the police cohort and encouraged to dance using a mix of traditional and popular styles. Kitted out in their police uniforms, the policewomen danced in a line or in small groups and invited the crowd to join in. In doing so, they helped quell protester anger and provided temporary entertainment and relief from a volatile situation that threatened to turn violent.

Police women strut their stuff, Jakarta Globe

A mother’s instinct

Many reasons have been given in support of the deployment of frontline policewomen. The head of the Jakarta Police operational bureau, Agung Budi Maryoto told the Jakarta Globe that the deployment was ‘based on ethical and human-rights considerations’ because ‘if the protesters appear to be female and then the protest turns violent, male officers trying to deal with them would be prone to sexual harassment allegations’. Additionally, he observed, the policewomen could help deal with any women protesters who fainted. Maryoto also revealed that the ‘negotiation skills and relaxed presence’ of the policewomen would help to calm the mobs. Adding her support to the deployment, policewoman Siti Prihidayati noted that, ‘Policewomen have a mother’s instincts, which are soft and non-violent’.

In many respects the approach taken by Polri is a pragmatic one. In these policewomen the Indonesian public sees an image far removed from the militaristic policeman who dominates coverage of deadly clashes in Papua and Poso. For many, policewomen may seem more approachable than men, less corrupt, and more likely to respond to requests for assistance in a sensitive and polite manner.

The policewomen selected to be the public face of the Force are young, beautiful, witty and present themselves as smart and approachable. They often have Facebook pages and Twitter sites and encourage interaction with everyday Indonesians. Many of these women make guest appearances on television talk shows and radio programs, and support numerous charity events. The public seem quite receptive to this image of Polri and proffer support for a more feminine police style.

Policewomen in Lombok patrol on bicycles, Sharyn Graham Davies

A counter-productive strategy

In the short term, the tactic of deploying beautiful policewomen might be good when considering means to improve the public image of the police. But in the long term, what impact might this have on efforts to turn Indonesia’s police force from a patriarchal paramilitary institution to one that embraces gender equity?

If Polri continues to exclusively present stunning policewomen the result is that the public will only accept stunning policewomen. Moreover, with the exclusive public presentation of beautiful policewomen, women that deem themselves as less attractive may decide that policing is not for them. If this happens, then Polri, and Indonesia as a whole, will miss out on getting a police force that is representative of society, and that embraces the ranges of skills needed to address Indonesia’s numerous problems.

In addition to appearance, the constant presentation of policewomen as useful only as a distraction cheapens the value and skill women bring to the Force. Speaking to the Jakarta Post, the National Police spokesman clearly undermined women’s ability to be effective police officers when he said in relation to the fuel protests, that ‘I don’t think the protesters will use any violence against women. Should anything happen, our [male] officers will protect their female colleagues.’ This rhetoric becomes self-fulfilling and policewomen themselves come to believe that their effectiveness is limited. As policewoman Lesnusa was quoted as saying in the same article, she and her women colleagues were prepared to negotiate with the protesters, but would step aside and let their male colleagues take over if that failed.

It is in Indonesia’s best interest to have a police force that mirrors the society it polices. Having more women in Polri (as well as representation from ethnic, religious, and sexual minorities) will help the police engage in more community-focused policing, a move that will benefit all Indonesians well into the future. But while the idea of promoting Polri through the use of images of policewomen as sweet and attractive may have some positives, this understanding of femininity is likely to be counter-productive in the long term because it promotes women officers as being too weak to do anything other than stand by being caring and sexy while male officers enforce the law.

Sharyn Graham Davies (sharyn.davies@aut.ac.nz) is Associate Professor in the Department of Social Sciences at Auckland University of Technology in New Zealand. Adrianus Meliala (adrianus.meliala@ui.ac.id) is Professor of Criminology at the University of Indonesia and has recently been appointed a Commissioner of Police Complaints. Adrianus completed his PhD at the University of Queensland. John Buttle (john.buttle@aut.ac.nz) is Senior Lecture in the Department of Social Sciences at Auckland University of Technology in New Zealand.

This article stems from a larger research project that the authors are working on in the field of policing in Indonesia funded through New Zealand’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade, AUT, and the University of Indonesia.

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May Slater

Dika and the children of Desa Pelita, Indonesia Mengajar

At the port in Desa Pelita, the sea is clear and the fish so plentiful that the locals joke they don’t need their nets; they sit on the jetty in the morning sun and wait for dinner to jump into their baskets. It’s a small island of mostly fishermen and coconut farmers in the far north-east of the Indonesian archipelago. ‘The villagers are financially poor but they are not really poor in that they have enough; they can get food easily and eat well,’ says Rahmut Danu Andika (Dika), who now calls the island his second home. But there is no electricity, internet or phones on Pelita. ‘They don’t get a lot of outside information so their expectations about their futures and their children’s futures don’t change,’ says Dika. ‘So we try to be a window to another future.’

Dika has just returned to Jakarta from a one-year teaching placement at Desa Pelita’s only primary school. At 25 years of age, he is not a teacher by training. He resigned from his job as an engineer in the Kalimantan coal mines to take up the role with Jakarta-based NGO Teaching Indonesia Movement (Indonesia Mengajar). Since 2010, Indonesia Mengajar has sent 170 of Indonesia’s best university graduates to some of the country’s most far-flung and poorly resourced communities.

Anies Baswedan is the organisation’s founder and vice-chancellor of Paramadina University in Jakarta. He says the formula is simple: get more qualified teachers into low socio-economic areas, ‘wait a few decades and see society transform’. His organisation selects the ‘crème de la crème’ from thousands of bright, young applicants. After an intensive seven-week training program in pedagogy, leadership and first-aid, the young teachers are deployed to isolated schools that lack teachers. Baswedan says each of them becomes ‘a role model, an initiator, and an inspiration’, planting hope and dreams in each village they join.

Universal primary education

At the 2012 Millennium Development Goal Awards in Jakarta this year the program received the Public Sector Special Award for its contribution to the futures of Indonesia’s children. According to United Nations statistics, Indonesia is making good progress towards its goals of universal primary education by 2015.

Approximately 95 per cent of children are enrolled in primary school and 95 per cent of 15-24 year olds are literate. This is a huge achievement for a country whose population was mostly illiterate when it gained its independence in 1945. At that time, 95 per cent of Indonesians couldn’t read or write and there were just 92 high schools and five universities for a population of 70 million. Few nations have been able to combat illiteracy in such a short period of time.

Anis Baswedan attributes Indonesia’s success to the Higher Education Student Deployment Program (Pengerahan Tenaga Mahasiswa) of the 1950s, an early model of what Indonesia Mengajar does today. The newly independent government set about building senior high schools in all of Indonesia’s districts and sent university students, mainly from Java, to teach for two years in outlying villages. The program ran for ten years in 161 schools across the country. The result, says Baswedan, was an ‘explosion’ of university students in the 1960s, from villages as well as from cities and villages, and from poor families as well as rich families. ‘Every student, parent and villager that was touched by those bright young people aspired to send their own children to university,’ he says.
But today, despite the promising UN statistics, children in remote villages across the Indonesian archipelago do not receive the same opportunities to learn and grow as those in the cities. According to the World Bank, only 55 per cent of children from low-income families are enrolled in junior secondary school and that the average student will receive just 5.8 years of schooling. In remote areas, the numbers are much lower. In West Papua, for example, 32 per cent of children under 15 are illiterate.

Almost half of all Indonesians living in rural and remote areas, poorly served by roads, books and qualified teachers. As a consequence, the opportunities for many are limited. Anies Baswedan says education in Indonesia is still very ‘urban-centric’: the majority of universities are located in the big cities and school textbooks refer to city life, alienating children from learning and from their environment. To achieve education for all, he says, investment and learning must be brought back to the community.

‘A child with low marks, from a poor family far from the city will have a problem to get quality education,’ says Baswedan. ‘Many young Indonesians have no access to higher education, not because they lack intellectual capacity, but because they do not have money to finance it.’

Young graduates

Since 2010, Indonesia Mengajar has been overwhelmed by more than 19,000 applications from young graduates wanting to teach. Dika was among 50 graduates accepted in the first year of the program. Having grown up in a big city, he considers himself lucky to have received a good education in a supportive environment, with good neighbours and opportunities. He says he applied for the program so that he could share this privilege and for the chance it offered to learn about his country. It took a four and a half hour flight to Ternate, a night ship to the island of Bachan, then a trip by motorbike, minibus and longboat before he reached Desa Pelita. He says the village was so small that ‘everyone knew everyone’. Fellow teacher, Granasti Aprilia (Asti) is a psychology graduate who spent last year in a small school in West Tulang Bawang, South Sumatra, five hours by plane from Jakarta. It’s a region of palm oil and rubber plantations and in the rainy season the streets become red mud rivers. ‘Some days it was like a waterfall coming down the hill, and to get to school, we’d have to put the motorcycles on canoes or wade through the flooded river,’ says Asti.

Both Desa Pelita and West Tulang Bawang are traditional communities that rely on the land for their livelihoods. The challenges Dika and Asti felt in promoting education when they arrived were the same. Asti says it was difficult to convince parents how important education is. In West Tulang Bawang people tap rubber and earn good money from palm, or they farm cassava for ethanol fuel. It is not obvious to them why their children need an education. They think: ‘Why send kids to school if we can get easy money from rubber?’ Asti’s students were often missing from class and parents would say they were sick or visiting grandparents. ‘But some families with young girls would keep them home to work,’ she says. So most days, she and another teacher would go around and pick the children up from the rubber fields.

Dika and Asti were the only teachers in their schools with bachelor degrees. Most teachers are senior high school graduates, who are not formally trained because it is too far and too expensive to get to the district capital for courses. Dika says he was shocked when he arrived in Desa Pelita to see teachers using a wooden stick with oyster shells attached to the end to discipline the children. ‘It was not because the teachers were cruel but because they knew no other method,’ he says.

The young graduates split their time in the villages between teaching and education advocacy in the broader community. From morning to noon they’d be in the classrooms, but evenings and weekends were spent teaching computing skills, English, self-confidence and career planning at the local high school. Dika says they also became medics, sex-educators, counselors and mobile phone technicians. ‘The villagers think that because we are from Jakarta we can do anything!’

In schools where students often have low expectations, Asti says they ‘make the children dare to have big dreams’. One of her students told her that her father had said she didn’t need an education because she could just go to work in another country as a maid when she grew up. But with encouragement and information about scholarship programs, three of the senior high school students from her district are now studying at university in Jakarta.

In this sense, the young graduates are fulfilling Indonesia Mengajar's other goal, which is to develop future leaders. Baswedan says that the program aims to develop a network of young people who can represent Indonesia globally, but who also have a grass-roots understanding of their country so that they can connect and relate to the people they are leading.

Asti and her pupils in Tulang Bawang Barat, Indonesia Mengajar

Life changing

For the young teachers themselves, the placements have been life changing. Dika says his year on the island inspired him; he learnt just how big his country is and ‘to appreciate things more’. Back in Jakarta, he has stopped wearing his wristwatch, saying he learnt from the islanders ‘not to chase the time but to glance at the sun’. In Desa Pelita, people look to the sky to see if it’s going to rain and they drink coffee until it passes, he says. ‘When it rains in the city, we sit in traffic jams for three hours!’

In 2012, a fourth round of 71 young graduates were deployed to replace teachers like Dika and Asti in the outer regions. Asti is now back in the capital working with one of Indonesia Mengajar’s sponsors, Indika Energy. But she calls West Tulang Bawang her ‘other family’ and plans to travel back to visit ‘her children’ soon. Dika hopes to win a scholarship to study in the United States next year. But for now, he has stayed on with Indonesia Mengajar as an outreach officer supporting new teachers.

At night in Desa Pelita, you can see the colours of the stars with the naked eye because there are no lights on the island or at sea. Dika says the children loved to stargaze and ask questions: ‘Why are there red and blue and yellow stars and why do I always see the same side of the moon every month?’ He’d explain what an astronaut is and when they replied that they all wanted to be astronauts when they grew up, he’d tell them: ‘Well you have to study very, very hard!’

Does he feel like he’s making a difference? According to Dika, ‘There are thousands of villages. We hope Indonesia Mengajar can be one of many community movements that can make Indonesia great,’ he says. ‘We hope that we can light more candles so that every child in the country believes they can be anything they want to be.’

May Slater (may_slater@hotmail.com) is a journalism student and freelancer in Sydney. May travelled to Jakarta in 2012 to work with Tempo magazine as part of a Journalism Professional Practicum with the Australian Consortium for 'In-Country' Indonesian Studies (ACICIS).

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Related articles from the II archive

I'm a terrific child - Dirk Tomsa
A new educational movement - Karen Bryner
Jungle schools - Butet Manurung
Classroom culture shock- Louise Blair

Inside Indonesia 111: Jan-Mar 2013{jcomments on}