RP foundation defends award for Pramoedya<\/p>\n
MANILA (AFP): The foundation granting Asia's most prestigious
\nliterary award yesterday rejected calls to withdraw its prize to
\na leftist Indonesian accused of once running a \"witch hunt\" on
\nwriters.<\/p>\n
Pramoedya Ananta Toer will receive the 1995 Ramon Magsaysay
\nAward even though two former winners from Indonesia and one from
\nthe Philippines have threatened to turn in their prizes in
\nprotest, the Magsaysay foundation said.<\/p>\n
\"The Foundation regrets having disappointed its esteemed
\nformer awardees but it remains firm in its decision to recognize
\nPramoedya\" with its 1995 award for journalism, literature, and
\ncreative communication arts, its statement said.<\/p>\n
A group of 26 Indonesian writers and intellectuals last week
\nwrote to the foundation criticizing the decision to grant the
\naward to Pramoedya, given his role in the suppression of freedom
\nof expression in the 1960s. Among the 26 were writer and
\njournalist Mochtar Lubis and writer H.B. Jassin, recipients of
\nthe award for literature.<\/p>\n
The foundation acknowledged that Pramoedya had been a member
\nof the communist-run Institute of People's Culture, known as
\nLekra, which in the 1960s attacked a number of prominent writers.<\/p>\n
\"The attacks and counter-attacks of the times were harsh and
\nwe are indeed aware that some writers suffered badly,\" it said.<\/p>\n
Current attacks on Pramoedya \"bear little moral weight in
\nlight of the penalties already imposed upon him as well as a
\nchange in world attitudes toward communism accompanying the end
\nof the Cold War,\" the foundation said.<\/p>\n
The foundation conceded that Ramon Magsaysay, the popular
\nPhilippine president for whom the U.S.-funded award was named,
\nhad \"despised communism.\"<\/p>\n
But it noted that he also \"carefully distinguished between the
\ncreed of communism and its individual followers\" and that he
\nfought communism in the Philippines by \"righting the wrongs that
\nmade the leftist appeal seductive in the first place.\"<\/p>",
"url": "https:\/\/jawawa.id\/newsitem\/rp-foundation-defends-award-for-pramoedya-1447893297",
"image": ""
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"sponsor": "Okusi Associates",
"sponsor_url": "https:\/\/okusiassociates.com"
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