Flags fail to fly half-mast on Sept. 30
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.