Flags fail to fly half-mast on Sept. 30
The Jakarta Post, Jakarta
It was hard to find any national flags being flown at half-mast on Tuesday, signaling that many Indonesians have forgotten about the shadowy Sept. 30 incident.
The Sept. 30 incident refers to the night when alleged members of the military wing of the Indonesia Communist Party (PKI) abducted and killed seven Army generals in a failed coup attempt in 1965. This is the official government view but accounts of what actually transpired vary widely.
In Jakarta, there were few red and white flags flying at half- mast. Even the State Palace failed to lower the flag.
State Palace official Garibaldi Sudjatmiko blamed the oversight on the Ministry of National Education, which he said should have told the palace and other government offices to commemorate the incident and fly the national flag at half-mast.
The national flag also failed to be lowered in other cities throughout Indonesia, including Bandung in West Java, Solo in Central Java, Yogyakarta, and Surabaya in East Java. In those cities, the national flag only flew at half-mast at government offices, while residents did not fly the flag at all.
"We haven't got instructions to fly the national flag at half- mast, so we didn't do it," a Surabaya resident said.
The scene was repeated in areas outside Java, including in Bengkulu and Banjarmasin, the capital of South Kalimantan.
The scenes were in contrast to those under the military-backed Soeharto regime when government offices, schools and even civilian houses were ordered to lower the flag.
Soeharto was very much anti-PKI, and was the Army general who assumed a leading role in aborting the alleged PKI coup.
Meanwhile in Jakarta, high ranking active and retired Army generals gathered in Lubang Buaya in East Jakarta Tuesday evening where the Sept. 30 tragedy took place.
In his speech, Gen. Ryamizard Ryacudu, the Army chief of Staff, said communism had not died yet and the nation must be vigilant to ensure communism was not revived in Indonesia.
He warned there was an indication that remnants of the outlawed PKI had used the media to form public opinion that the movement to crush the PKI in 1966 had violated human rights.
"The gathering is held in order to make us vigilant over the danger of the PKI revival," he told the gathering, attended by, among others, former Army chief Gen. (ret). Edi Sudradjat.
Separately, Muslim figures urged the government to fight poverty, because poverty had led to the communism movement, said Chalid Mawardi, the chairman of Majelis Dakwah Islamiyah.
Communism once took a leading role in Indonesian politics in the 1960s. Its only rival was the Army.
Meanwhile, House Speaker Akbar Tandjung urged President Megawati Soekarnoputri to attend the commemoration of the Sanctity Day of Pancasila on Oct. 1, held in Lubang Buaya, East Jakarta.
Oct. 1 was a turning point for the PKI, and through commemorating this day, the Soeharto regime wanted to show the people that the state ideology, Pancasila, could not be replaced by communist ideology.
Akbar said that Oct. 1 was a great moment for all, which symbolized the demise of communism, so the President must not miss it.
President Megawati Soekarnoputri, daughter of founding president Sukarno who was ousted after the alleged coup, failed to attend the commemoration last year, drawing strong criticism from family members of the seven murdered generals.