A coming state visit of President Megawati to Holland?

A coming state visit of President Megawati to Holland?

Lambert J Giebels, Historian, Breda, The Netherlands

The 400th anniversary of the Dutch East India Company (VOC) was commemorated last month in The Hague. One of the speakers was the economist Kwik Kian Gie, who, in addition to a critical analysis of the history of the VOC conveyed a personal message from President Megawati Soekarnoputri. The message was that her father, despite his lifelong struggle against the colonial system, never disliked the Dutch people, and that an ardent wish of his had been to visit the Netherlands one day.

Kwik Kian Gie's communication has been understood in The Hague as a signal from President Megawati that she herself is prepared to accept an invitation by the Dutch government for a state visit.

During Sukarno's presidency, the Dutch government twice considered inviting him for a state visit. The first time was in 1950, when the Dutch Cabinet discussed the benefits of inviting the president of the newborn Republic of Indonesia. Then prime minister Willem Drees canceled the plan, however, when Sukarno on Aug. 18, 1950 dissolved the Dutch-established Federation of Indonesia and proclaimed the Unitarian Republic of Indonesia.

In the following 13 years a state visit by Sukarno to the Netherlands became unthinkable, because of the increasing conflict over West Irian, that actually brought both countries to the brink of war. The situation changed completely after West Irian had been transferred to Indonesia on the May 1, 1963. With each passing day thereafter the embittered enemies became better friends. There is an explanation for this remarkable transformation.

Sukarno had isolated his country with his policy of confrontation with Malaysia and his flirtation with communist China. The only friend in the West was the Netherlands, which was not overly concerned about the policies towards Malaysia and China.

All of a sudden Dutch commercial circles discovered that they could profit by cultivating exclusive economic ties with the former colony. For most of 1963, Dutch industrialists, bankers and trading tycoons came one after the other to visit the hospitalized, Dutch-speaking president Sukarno, hoping to find out how to exploit the promising profits in Indonesia.

On his first official visit to the Netherlands, in April 1964, then foreign minister H. Soebandrio made it clear to his counterpart, J. Luns, that restoration of the profitable economic relations with Indonesia would be greatly stimulated by a state visit from the Indonesian president.

In August of that year, Luns made a return visit to Indonesia. During a closing meeting with Sukarno, the president told his guest that they both were eagerly waiting an invitation. After his return Luns explained to the Dutch Cabinet that, if one wished to strengthen the new bonds of friendship with Indonesia, a state visit by the long-despised Sukarno was necessary.

The invitation had to come from head of state, Queen Juliana, who was somewhat reluctant. In the correspondence between Dutch diplomats, she had read some juicy stories, circulating in diplomatic circles, about visits by womanizer Sukarno to western countries. The worries by the queen about the behavior of the expected guest at her palace was after all not completely groundless. Soebandrio had told me that Bung Karno, while chatting about his possible visit to the Netherlands, had announced that he would pay a visit to the Walletjes in Amsterdam -- and it was not certain that his visit to this notorious red- light district in the city center would be limited to presidential sight-seeing.

Queen Juliana was well aware that, according to protocol, she could only realize her dream of visiting Indonesia only after the Indonesian president had paid a state visit to her country.

Queen and Cabinet agreed tentatively that president Sukarno would officially visit sometime in 1966. The plan did not materialize however, due to the fact that the coup of Oct.1, 1965, signaled the beginning of the end for Sukarno. Juliana had to wait until 1969 when the new president Soeharto made a state visit to Holland -- but even that was shortened by a kidnapping of the Indonesian ambassador in The Hague by Moluccans, and became more of a stopover than a visit.

In 1971, the dream of queen Juliana came true at last. Her visit to Indonesia was the high point of Juliana's state visits. Her reception in Indonesia, in which crowds of students welcomed her at UI, cheering: "tante, tante", was overwhelming. At the end of her visit the queen made it abundantly clear on Indonesian television, how moved she was by the cordiality of the Indonesian people. She did it by repeating three times a few Indonesian words she had learned during her two-week visit: "terimah kasih, terimah kasih, terimah kasih!"

President Megawati can count on a similarly warm welcome in the Netherlands, and I guess that her visit instead of the once- intended visit of her father will be equally as overwhelming.