A grassroots celebration

A grassroots celebration

This year is monumental for the Republic of Indonesia, which
will reach 50 years of age in August. And it seems the world will
be celebrating to. The anniversary committee has announced that
several other nations have expressed interest in taking part in
the celebration because Indonesia was one of the first nations to
gain independence after World War II.

Indonesia's turbulent revolution, which inspired oppressed
people worldwide with new hope of independence, was a movement
involving people from all levels of society, with the grassroots
providing the courage, energy and drive to carry through on the
vision of the archipelago's revolutionary leaders.

For this reason, as the organizing committee chaired by
former minister of environment Emil Salim has announced, the
celebration's theme is "expressing gratitude to God for
independence by strengthening ties with the grassroots level of
society".

With this theme, the nation will celebrate its independence
anniversary with festive events and religious activities
predominantly managed by people living at the grassroots level of
society, especially those in rural areas. In short, it is to be a
celebration by the people for the people in gratitude to the
nation's leaders for bringing about and maintaining the nation's
independence by the grace of God.

The theme, which President Soeharto underlined in his speech
before the House of Representatives on Jan. 5, reminds us that
the feeling of gratitude toward the populace for the success of
the independence movement is genuine on the part of the nation's
leadership.

The republic was set up by the people, the military was born
from the womb of the populace, and it was the people who fed the
troops during the guerrilla war for independence. General
Sudirman, the father of the Armed Forces, who led the fight,
while he was suffering from serious lung trouble, sought refuge
among the people in the rural areas during the peak months of the
warfare, between December 1948 and July 1949.

Given this history, the public is sure to warmly welcome the
committee's decision, although some people are bound to ask
whether enough has been done to respect the people's
constitutional rights and to wipe out the craze for social status
which has gravely widened the gap between the rich and the poor
over the past 50 years. Another question also likely to surface
is: Just how successful has the government been at developing the
spiritual and cultural sectors in order to counter the negative
impacts of rapid modernization?

There are 27 million Indonesians still living under the
poverty line -- some of whom exist on a stone age level -- while
a few hundred others are vying with each other to build posh
living quarters and extravagant golf courses for the few thousand
who can afford them.

All of this seems to indicate a decrease in the people's sense
of social solidarity and a tendency toward moral decay of the
populace as the nation nears its 50th independence anniversary.

This has not gone unnoticed. The fruits of independence we
have experienced thus far, have also make our populace,
especially the younger generation, more critical and outspoken,
but by no means less patriotic.

Therefore, we sincerely hope that the nation's current
leadership, many of whom are members of the 1945 Generation, will
continue to make every effort to guarantee the people's
constitutional rights by giving everyone a greater say in the
country's future. In this way, the love everyone born and raised
in this archipelago feels for the nation can be harnessed, as was
the courage of the grassroots in the revolutionary period, to
carry the nation to greater successes.