Former PKI prisoners still waiting for freedom

Former PKI prisoners still waiting for freedom

The Jakarta Post, Surabaya/Kutai Kartanegara

For the suspected members of the outlawed Communist Party of
Indonesia (PKI) and their families, the country's anniversary
celebration has always been a bitter time, bringing back old
memories.

Tjahjono, 70, could not control his emotions and broke down
into tears as he recalled the time last year when his daughter
was denied an application to become a teacher in an elementary
school in Pontianak simply because of the "special mark" on her
identity card.

The card bears the code 001, a "scarlet letter" that was
forced upon everybody related to PKI's accused members. And his
daughter was not the only one who suffered. Tjahjono's three
other children also were turned down by private and state
institutions, and now are all unemployed.

"I feel disappointed in the government because my children
have to suffer, although they don't even know what really
happened at that time," the chairman of New Order Victims
Rehabilitation in Malang told The Jakarta Post.

The former civil engineering lecturer at the Malang Teachers
Institute, who lost his job after accusations that he was a PKI
supporter, claimed he was accused simply because he was close
friends with PKI supporters.

"I knew nothing about PKI, but people just didn't care. They
thought that because I was close to some supporters, I was one of
them," he said.

The PKI was accused of masterminding the bloody failed coup by
on Sept. 30, 1965 -- referred to by Indonesia's historians as the
September 30 Movement, or GS-30 -- which resulted in the killings
of several military generals. Former president Soeharto rose to
power after the failed coup, and his government sent thousands of
PKI members and their relatives to prison without trial.

In the years following the fall of Soeharto, general
conditions were less hostile to the suspected PKI members and
their families. Early last year, the Constitutional Court
restored the political rights of those linked with the communist
party by allowing them to vote and contest the legislative
election.

Tjahjono said that before he was accused, which got him thrown
in Nusakambangan prison and later Buru island for 10 years, he
was an independence fighter, who once fought the Allied Forces in
Malang. But instead of being appreciated as a war hero, he and
his family were branded as PKI members.

He tried to bring up the problem at various discussions to
press the government to restore their civil and political rights,
but unfortunately for him, nothing has changed.

In the East Kalimantan town of Kutai Kartanegara, 85-year-old
Gusti was ailing in bed in his wooden house.

"The pain I'm suffering is nothing compared to what the
country has done to me and others accused as traitors. We're left
in misery," he said.

The country's anniversary celebration has no meaning for the
man since he still feels alienated and is not free from the
accusations of being a PKI member.

"We fought against the colonial rulers. We helped set the
country free from aggressors, but we end up being sacrificed by
our own country," Gusti sighed.

For the man -- as well as around 175 other ex-prisoners
accused of being PKI members who live in Argosari, a poor and
isolated village nicknamed by locals as the "PKI village" -- the
country's Independence Day on Aug. 17 brings back old memories
that they, as well as their family members, are not free.

"We earlier hoped that the government of (former) president
Megawati Soekarnoputri would restore our names. But it didn't
happen. We still are not completely free," said another ex-
prisoner, Oentong Soeyatno, 65, secretary of the Group of New
Order Victims in the province.

Political observer Daniel Sparringa of the Airlangga
University said many relatives of former PKI members had lost
their basic rights as citizens -- particularly for equal rights
under the law. He said the government should restore their rights
through rehabilitation efforts and compensation.

"The government should straighten out our history, either by
exposing the PKI's cruelty or the manipulation of the PKI
organization by the New Order regime," he told the Post.