Indonesian Political, Business & Finance News

Associations and

| Source: AB

Associations and nationalism

Minister of Defense and Security Gen. Edi Sudradjat gave his support to the establishment of the Association of Indonesian National Intellectuals (ICKI) initiated by Krisnadwipayana University Rector R. Muhono and backed by 17 private universities.

President Soeharto once pointed out that it is wrong for us to divide ourselves into several different groups with narrow outlooks reflecting ancestral backgrounds, ethnical origins, social statuses or religions, considering that the 1945 Constitution guarantees equal rights to all under the law.

Minister Edi followed up on this idea by emphasizing that an association of intellectuals characterized by a sense of nationalism is essential for a pluralistic country in order to maintain integrity and unity, instead of promoting the ideas of ethnic, tribal or religious states.

According to the rector, the new association, ICKI, is not intended as a competitor for the two previously established associations, ICMI (Association of Indonesian Moslem Intellectuals) and PIKI (Association of Indonesian Christian Intellegensia). But rather, ICKI, is expected to function as a binding force for all established associations.

In view of this, a relevant question may arise as to whether more associations will emerge to group Javanese intellectuals, Sundanese intellectuals, or Sumatran scholars, etc., or whether other religion-oriented organizations will come into being.

-Angkatan Bersenjata, Jakarta

Recent developments bring us face to face with the fact that our sense of nationalism is facing hard challenges. In truth, it can be concluded that our feeling of nationalism is eroding.

Verily, the process of democratization and the pluralistic nature of our nation, may turn out to be a threat to nationalistic sentiment.

In view of this situation, we hail the discussions to be held this week by the Functional Group (Golkar), focusing on the issue of nationalism to welcome the forthcoming Awakening Day, May 20.

We hope that the result of the deliberations will serve to consolidate our sense of togetherness and the concept of all of us being integral elements of one nation.

--Suara Karya, Jakarta

Doing as many virtuous acts as possible is the commitment made by the Association of Indonesian Moslem Intellectuals, ICMI, in the wake of the emergence of several other associations with different characteristics and concepts.

ICMI was not born by accident. It is based upon long and persistent thought among its supporters. And it was established against the background of the strong commitment of Moslems to make progress and to initiate innovative change.

--Republika, Jakarta

View JSON | Print