Dutch envoy van Roijen bids farewell to Indonesia
By Linawati Sidarto
JAKARTA (JP): When Ambassador Jan Herman Robert Dudley van Roijen began his tenure here in early 1992, relations between the Netherlands and Indonesia were at a low ebb. Two months earlier the Netherlands had frozen its aid to Indonesia, in a protest against the Dili incident in November 1991.
"Some of my Indonesian friends said I'd arrived here at a low point, which is good psychology because things could only improve, and they did," reminisced van Roijen, who will be leaving Jakarta this week to take a new post as ambassador for the United Kingdom and Iceland.
In some ways van Roijen is a special envoy to Indonesia as his family name is ingrained in the nation's history. His father Dr. J.H. van Roijen was one of Netherlands' most important diplomats in post World War II. He signed the Roem-Roijen agreement in 1949, which preceded the official transfer of power from the Dutch to the Indonesians and presided over the pulling out of the Dutch troops from Dutch New Guinea, now Irian Jaya.
Jan Herman Van Roijen said it was his father who inspired him to join the diplomatic corps.
"When I was six years old, I actually wanted to be a zoo director," said the ambassador, who was born in 1936.
Van Roijen said his knowledge of Indonesia and its people assisted him in getting through his first difficult months here.
In March 1992, barely a month after he presented his credentials, he was summoned by then senior economic minister Radius Prawiro and told about Indonesia's decision to reject further Dutch aid, and the demand for the dissolution of the Inter-Governmental Group on Indonesia, a western aid donor consortium chaired by the Netherlands.
This was Indonesia's pointed response towards developmental aid being tied to its human rights record, in the wake of the 1991 Dili tragedy.
"This (decision) came to us rather unexpectedly. We didn't know the Indonesian government was going to take this measure.
"It was no longer business as usual. In the beginning, we really had to make an effort at the Embassy to mount an offensive, to talk with virtually everybody, to explain that the Netherlands hoped all other elements of the relationship would be enhanced."
According to Frans Seda, chairman of the Indonesia Netherlands Association, van Roijen was quite successful in isolating the aid issue and preventing that from spreading to other areas.
"In a way, this (rejection of aid) was a blessing in disguise, since relations between the two countries are substantially better now, than they were before 1992. We can approach each other as completely equal partners, and have cooperation on an equal basis," van Roijen explained.
The Netherlands is currently the sixth largest foreign investor in Indonesia. Volume of trade between the two countries last year totaled more than US$1.5 billion, a 30-percent increase from the previous year.
During his tenure here, van Roijen said, a record number of Dutch ministers visited Indonesia, and also other prominent figures, from politicians to members of the Dutch royal family.
When asked whether any economic aid exists since the dissolution of IGGI, van Roijen emphasized again that anything between the two countries is based on mutual cooperation on an equal level. Recently, he said, a steering committee on education and scientific affairs has been set up which will make it possible for the Indonesian and Dutch governments to allocate budgetary funds for those purposes.
The funds amounted to about US$2.7 million. However, he stressed, "We do not call it aid."
As former colony and colonizer, Indonesia and the Netherlands, naturally have a relationship that lends itself to special circumstances. For example, the fact that many members of the Indonesian upper middle class, especially those in advanced age, speak fluent Dutch and have more than a casual bond with the Netherlands.
On the other hand, there are also instances like the visa rejection, in August last year, for Indonesian human rights activist H.J.C. Princen. Princen, who deserted the Dutch army in the 1940s, joined the Indonesian side and later became an Indonesian citizen. This personal record has rendered some people in the Netherlands to oppose Princen's visit to his native country.
When asked about some parties alleging that the visa rejection was decided in Indonesia, van Roijen curtly answered: "I don't confirm that. It's a matter between me and my government that I can't expand upon."
Queen Beatrix's planned visit to Indonesia in August next year, the time Indonesia will celebrate its 50th anniversary, has also sparked some discussion in the Netherlands.
Even though Indonesia declared its independence in 1945, the Netherlands did not formally recognize it until the end of 1949. During those years, armed clashes between the two sides resulted in casualties not negligible in numbers. So, some people in the Netherlands tend to deem that acknowledgment of the 1945 independence makes the sacrifices made between 1945 and 1949 seem superfluous, and therefore are against such formal recognition, van Roijen explained.
"Parliament will discuss it, but my educated guess is they will favor the Queen visiting Indonesia," predicted van Roijen, whose own family is closely acquainted with the Dutch royal family.
Previous to being posted as ambassador here, van Roijen had served twice as a diplomat in Indonesia, first in the 60s, and then again in the early 80s.
In April 1965, van Roijen started his first diplomatic post as third secretary at the Dutch Embassy in Jakarta. He stayed until 1967, which made him witness to a dark page in the history of the young republic. On the evening of Sept. 30, 1965, van Roijen recalled, there was a party given by the ambassador of Italy. Around 10 p.m., some Indonesians guests were abruptly summoned and had to leave the party. "I don't want to say who they were, but the people summoned were so interesting that we knew something was coming off," he said about the event later known as the aborted communist coup.
When van Roijen leaves Indonesia Thursday he will leave behind a country that has probably meant more to him than just a place where he worked. When his second daughter was due to be born on an early morning in May 1966, he recalled, the van Roijen couple barely made it to Saint Carolus hospital in Central Jakarta, due to the student demonstrations in the streets.
When asked whether he would have done anything differently, if he knew then what he knows now, van Roijen replied, "Not a thing. It's like a marriage, they go well, and there is nothing substantial you would have done differently. I really mean that."