After 7 years, it gets increasingly clear who are the losers

After 7 years, it gets increasingly clear who are the losers

Half an hour after I shouted a joyous scream with my
housemates having watched the live broadcast of president
Soeharto announcing his resignation seven years ago, a fellow
student called, asking us to meet at our campus.

Fifteen minutes later, still wearing my triumphant grin, I
arrived to find about a dozen friends sitting under a mango tree.
To my puzzlement, they all looked grim. It was a national
holiday, so most students stayed home and the campus was
deserted.

"Damn, we lose!" a friend, nicknamed by fellow students "Karl-
Marx-himself" due to his penchant for quoting Marx, uttered in
vexation. I, an idiot in this group of movement activists who
often thought themselves to be infallible, was even more puzzled
by this statement. Wasn't this time for celebration after years
of fighting and sometimes hiding from police and military?

Later he explained that the resignation would mean losing
thousands of erstwhile apathetic students, who in 1998 began to
join rallies protesting the regime's bad behavior.

"They (the students) will think they have won and they won't
continue the fight. Whereas, we still have a lot to do," he said.

His explanation rendered me speechless. I recalled before
1998, how our rallies protesting violence by the state, such as
the bloody crackdown of Megawati Soekarnoputri's supporters on
July 27, 1996 and the closures of Tempo, Editor weekly magazines
and Detik daily tabloid in 1994, only had a few dozen
participants.

In 1998, every protest rally attracted thousands of
participants from all universities and people in Yogyakarta. The
record number occurred the day before Soeharto resigned, when
millions of Yogyakartans took to the streets.

I don't know who coined the name of the movement reformasi. To
my recollection, me and fellow student activists never yelled the
word during rallies. We consistently demanded two things: Bring
Soeharto down (later after he resigned it became "Put Soeharto on
trial") and put the military back into their barracks.

The following morning, the campus was bustling, crowded with
students who were beaming and ecstatic. Some of the boys even
shaved their head to celebrate the victory.

But at that time, thanks to "Karl-Marx-himself", I did not
feel happy. I felt like a fool and a loser. And I increasingly
felt like one because Karl-Marx-himself was right. Later, rallies
to demand a trial for Soeharto had far few participants. A year
later, when I spent two months in a village in Central Java,
dissatisfaction over the slow pace of (if not progressing in the
wrong direction) reformasi began to arise. Villagers asked us
university students who they thought had sowed the idea, about
why reformasi had not yet done any good for them. I honestly
answered that I did not know, I was not the one who invented the
concept. They looked at me incredulously, staring at me as if I
was a fool, which was quite true. Now, seven years have passed
since that grim day under the mango tree.

"Karl-Marx-himself", now works as an editor in a lifestyle
magazine for men, writing tips for buying cool shoes and
reviewing fancy restaurants (once he frowned about my lack of
knowledge of things he considered fashionable like sushi and
wasabi).

Another radical friend whose name was then at the top of the
wanted list of military and police intelligence now is trying his
luck with the largest political party, which years ago we hated
so much.

Others succumbed into worse fates of pure psychological lunacy
or the disillusionment of a successful socialist revolution.

These losers and I now have to accept a military man reigning
at the highest position in the political realm. Okay, he has
retired. Nevertheless, he is still a military man (we cannot put
the adjective "former" before military, can we?).

This military president is now busy cleansing the government
of all the corrupt people, mostly civilians.

So far, he is not doing so bad. During his administration we
have seen civilians Abdullah Puteh, Bank Mandiri directors and
KPU officials put under investigation or put on trial for graft.
At the same time we can only watch him visiting another graft
suspect, Soeharto himself, his senior officer in the military, in
an amiable if not prostrate manner.

Any protests about this political farce would not gain a large
following. We can only grumble about Soeharto's successful
evasion of justice.

Seven years ago, it only took me an hour to realize who the
losers were in this fight for change. Recently, my mind wandered,
asking myself who was the biggest loser. But I think, I don't
really want to know.

--Evi Mariani