Dark days for slain taxi driver's family

By Mehru Jaffer

JAKARTA (JP): First he lost his job to the cruel krismon (monetary crisis), and then his life, too.

Until recently Mansyur, 51, was an administrative officer in a mining company in Palu, South Sulawesi.

Laid off in the economic crisis like millions of others, he was forced to abandon a middle-class lifestyle and move back to Jakarta almost half a year ago. Failing to find another job in a city that once brimmed with countless opportunities, Mansyur was left with little choice but to drive a taxi to support his wife and five children.

His wife, Titin, an elegant beauty from Banten, West Java, says she quickly accepted her fate and learned to manage with whatever she had.

That is until her husband was found dead in the taxi on April 11 with his throat slit, as the engine of the vehicle continued to whir long after the gruesome murder was committed.

Titin thinks her husband may have had only Rp 150,000 (US$17) on him when he was robbed and killed. It was perhaps Mansyur's inexperience in his newfound job, which involves a certain savvy in dealing with the many dangers on the city's mean streets, that finally robbed him of both his hard-earned money and his life.

Criminal activities and incidents of violence have escalated here since the iron rule of Soeharto came to a sudden end nearly a year ago, flinging wide open the yearnings of Indonesians for freedom. However, few seem to know what to do about the unrest that insists on accompanying the country's journey toward democracy. It is not rare for the city's 10 million population to experience a daily brush with some form of violence, ranging from petty theft to deadly killings.

With the country's first democratic elections in many years just around the corner, there is the fear that worse incidents of violence are still to come.

What is most tragic about the present day chaos is the fact that a whole generation is growing up without much hope for the future. Mansyur's only son, Virsan, suffers from a mental block. He seems to be totally lost. Already 19 years old, he is ashamed that he is unable to concentrate on completing his high school studies.

His eyes light up with anger as he refuses to answer all questions about his plans for the future. Smoking nonstop, Virsan feels humiliated at the sudden fall in his social status and angry at the tragic and unexpected murder of his father.

When all was well with his world, before the economy crashed and his father still had the job he deserved, the family income was Rp 1 million per month. Then, there had seemed enough food, clothes and education for everyone.

Now he has to depend upon his 20-year-old sister Ruli to pay his education fee. He does not like that. He has resolved the problem simply by not going to school.

So how does he spend his time? "He will watch television a little, then meet his friends, but he never wants to say what he talks to his friends about. Some of them are also dropouts. It is as if he has lost all sense of responsibility," says Ruli, a graduate of Jakarta's Tourism High School.

Ruli has a job as a waitress in a hotel, which is an hour away from her home in an East Jakarta kampong. She is on her feet for eight hours on the job; in a good month, she has come home with Rp 500,000, but when business is lean she can receive as little as Rp 200,000.

But that is not how misty-eyed Ruli dreamt of spending the rest of her life. She wanted to continue learning languages. She would have liked to be an interpreter in the tourist industry, not merely a waitress.

Always a top-ranked student, Ruli studied Japanese in school and fears that she may lose the language if she does not find the time or money to continue her studies. On the other hand, if she has a choice between helping her 17-year-old sister Melissa, who has one more year before she graduates also from the tourism school, she will gladly choose to do everything she can for her kid sister.

Titin, a housewife all her life, never gave a thought to making money. But she, too, plans to pull out her old sewing machine and try her favorite hobby of making clothes to earn a living. After all, her daughter, Adut, 10, is determined to become a doctor.

Mansyur's elderly mother sits by quietly, her head lowered in grief. Lili, 9, bites her lower lip as she fights back tears when she is asked a question.

Zulfiqar, a 21-year-old relative who sits smoking silently in a corner of the house, recently graduated from high school. He is now desperately looking for a job. Just any kind of a job, he says.

What does he feel about the turmoil around him? He is convinced that one day the chaos in the country will calm down. Asked if he would also loot and riot like crowds of other, very angry young people if he does not find a job soon, Zulfiqar said he cannot imagine himself ever getting violent.

"I do feel frustrated but I am not angry, even though I know that many dark days are ahead for all young people like me."