25,000 students rally for reform

25,000 students rally for reform

JAKARTA (JP): About 25,000 students held noisy but largely
peaceful demonstrations demanding reform and clean governance
over the past two days in Jakarta, Surabaya, Yogyakarta and other
cities in Java.

Some 10,000 Moslem youths assembled after Friday prayers at
the Al Azhar Grand Mosque in South Jakarta. Braving the rain and
amid shouts of Allahu Akbar (God is Great), the youths spent two
hours listening to fiery speeches delivered by student leaders
from various universities.

"The government must take responsibility for the crisis and
ask for the people's forgiveness," a student leader shouted from
the podium.

"We not only want change, but improvement. Change may not
always be improvement, while improvement certainly means change,"
another speaker said.

Fachri Hamzah, chairman of the Association of Indonesian
Moslem Students (KAMMI) who organized the protest, called on
students, legislators and the general public to be critical and
not to waver in demands for an end to the corruption, collusion
and nepotism that pervades in the Indonesian government.

"We call on the people not to believe everything said by the
government and to remain critical," he said. The crowd waved
banners calling for "peaceful reform" and for the military to
"protect the people, not nepotism" in response.

"We are not the enemy and we do not want to clash with ABRI
(the Armed Forces)," he said. The rally concluded peacefully.

Also in Jakarta, demonstrations took place on Thursday at the
Teachers Training Institute and Jakarta University campus, both
in East Jakarta.

In Yogyakarta, thousands of members and supporters of
Muhammadiyah Moslem organization held a tabligh akbar (grand
prayer gathering) and listened to their chairman, Amien Rais,
speak on the need for reform. Amien said that Indonesians should
not be proud about having to turn to the International Monetary
Fund (IMF) for assistance.

The bailout package organized by the IMF made Indonesia
"surrender its soul," Amien said.

Also in Yogyakarta, 10,000 students assembled at Gadjah Mada
University on Thursday and demanded political and economic
reform. The demonstration was organized by KAMMI. Unlike previous
demonstrations marred by clashes with security forces which left
dozens of people injured, Thursday's demonstration concluded
peacefully.

In Depok, West Java, some 5,000 students from University of
Indonesia and other colleges gathered, read poems and sang songs
critical of the government.

The same group of students then attended a discussion on
social change which featured former ministers Emil Salim and
Siswono Yudohusodo.

In Bandung, West Java, thousands of students held
demonstrations on Thursday at Bandung Institute of Technology,
the Teachers Training Institute and Bandung Islamic University.
Students from the technology institute tried to leave their
campus, but were prevented from doing so by hundreds of security
personnel and a number of armored vehicles.

In Semarang and Surakarta in Central Java, students from a
number of universities came together on Thursday and shouted
demands for economic, political and legal reform. No clashes were
reported.

In Surabaya, the capital of East Java, fifteen staff lecturers
from the state-run Airlangga University protested at the security
forces' harsh treatment of demonstrating students and threatened
to go on strike if the violence continued.

One of the lecturers, Daniel Sparingga, made the promise when
he spoke before some 500 demonstrating students at the Airlangga
campus on Thursday.

"Security personnel used batons, 'yellow liquid' and stones to
frighten the students. We cannot tolerate that any longer,"
Daniel said, adding that he and his colleagues did not agree with
the ban placed by Minister of Education and Culture Wiranto
Arismunandar on student involvement in practical political
activities.

A demonstration involving a further 200 Surabaya students took
place at Dr. Sutomo University. Students displayed their anger at
injuries inflicted on 18 protesters during an earlier
demonstration by beating up a plain-clothes police officer.
(swe/23/nur/har/43)