Everyday human rights violations under the New Order

Everyday human rights violations under the New Order

By Mohtar Mas'oed

YOGYAKARTA (JP): The following stories were familiar to many
of us during the New Order period.

Darmin, an orange seller from Nganjuk, always traveled from
villages in East Java to Jakarta's markets. On the way he often
got into trouble because of his failure to "keep things in
order." Police officers patrolling interprovincal roads could
always find fault with him: absence of delivery orders,
incomplete documents for transporting merchandise and the like.

Every journey he would encounter a different mishap.

Darmin, however, was a good citizen, one who was smart and
understanding. He could always find his way out of trouble
through musyawarah (discussion to reach consensus) with the use
of mutually understood language. Without this skill, he would
have missed the opportunity to get ahead of other traders on the
way to market. Late arrival meant a long queue and the
possibility of late payment.

Darmin always knew that the trouble he met on the way could
mean bankruptcy. Unfortunately, he did not know that as a human
being he had the right to travel freely in the country of his
birth without needing the cumbersome papers. Then, the officers
who harassed him might also have been ignorant of the fact that
they were violating Darmin's basic human rights.

There was another person, Parman, a clove grower from
Temanggung in Central Java. He wanted to earn more from his
cloves. He heard the price of cloves in a neighboring regency,
Magelang, was higher. Unfortunately, selling cloves outside the
district of a clove grower's domicile was prohibited. As a
result, Parman had to take the cloves he grew to Magelang
stealthily, like a thief. An officer explained the purpose of the
prohibition to him, but Parman could not understand it. The
officer himself may not have understood it either.

One day Durasim, a farm laborer in Situbondo, East Java, was
visited by an official who told him that he had to move because
the government needed his land for development purposes. What
development? asked Durasim. The official did not reply, but his
countenance showed that he was offended by the question. Durasim
knew right away that as a commoner he could not pose such a
question. Just like Darmin and Parman, Durasim was only confused.

Cooperative

Then there was Marjuki, a lime seller in Jember, East Java,
who once had the bright idea to organize small-scale businessmen
in his village into a cooperative. He hoped that in this way they
could sell their limes directly to factories. The cooperative was
set up and briefly ran well until it had to be dissolved because
the regulations stated there could be only one cooperative per
village, namely the government-controlled village cooperative
(Koperasi Unit Desa).

Unfortunately for Marjuki and his friends, the management of
the village cooperative did not wish to penetrate big markets
directly but preferred to sell their produce through large
distributors. They argued that large distributors could guarantee
sustainable marketing.

Marjuki had been a university student for a short time and he
knew that he had the freedom of assembly. However, the district
head simply turned a deaf ear to his suggestions.

In the New Order era, confusion like in the above examples
occurred frequently among the smaller people in our society. Is
it true that you must have a number of papers to travel around
the country? Can the national economy be split like in the clove
story? Isn't a land owner entitled to information about why he
has to relinquish his land? Is it taboo to exercise the right of
assembly to fight for a certain cause?

Many people could not answer these questions and they became
confused. Unfortunately the government did not have much time to
provide them with the answers. Or maybe the government was
confused too?

The above cases show the dilemma faced in enforcing human
rights in this country. Frequently the problem does not lie in
the violation of civil rights (such as the right of travel) or
their political rights (such as the right of assembly and the
freedom to express an opinion), rather the problem lies in
conceptualization.

On the conceptual level the New Order government placed a
greater emphasis on certain economic and social rights, namely
the right to be free from hunger, unemployment, poverty and the
like.

In this sense, human rights were technical problems to be
solved by development undertakings.

If material needs such as food, clothing and housing could be
provided for then it would be easier to handle other problems
related to human rights, so the logic went. It was believed that
these needs could only be fulfilled if economic development
proceeded unimpeded.

Meanwhile, activists fighting for human rights saw the other
side of the coin. To them, the real goals of development, namely
justice and prosperity, could be attained only if citizens were
allowed to exercise their civil rights (the rights to determine
one's residence, to travel, to profess a religion) and political
rights (the rights of assembly, opinion). These activists
considered the observance of such rights to be prerequisite to
achieving justice and prosperity.

The above stories show how small infringements of human rights
can disrupt productivity.

The situation remained the same throughout the life of the New
Order government. The government showed a stubborn unwillingness
to entertain any discussion of the matter and was unassailable
with logic. As a result, the country's political life was fraught
with tension and danger.

In a recent discussion, an expert on Indonesia, Daniel Lev,
disclosed that the number of people who died in politically-
related violence from the end of 1968 onward was higher than at
any other time in the country's history.

Political life in 1950, when the country was still in its
infancy, was characterized by a much smaller number of deaths
associated with political violence, so what has made the New
Order so bloody? One of the most likely causes may be the fact
that the government attempted to develop the economy very rapidly
at a time when society at large, stripped of its civil and
political rights, could exert virtually no influence or control
over the ruling clique's activities.

The Habibie administration has the opportunity to avoid these
mistakes and the incentive to this end is quite considerable.
What is needed is national reconciliation. Economic recovery will
need the support of all groups in society and this will only be
possible if they are all allowed to voice their concerns and
interests without restriction.

In the international arena one of the main requirements to
gain support, both in commercial and political spheres, is the
recognition and upholding of human rights.

Let us prove that the Indonesian government is not a Moloch
God, a god who eats his own children.