Govt criticized for reconciling with New Order elements

Kurniawan Hari and Tiarma Siboro, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

Critics have lashed out at the government of President Megawati Soekarnoputri for its reconciliation with leading figures of the New Order regime and, in doing so, ignoring their human rights record.

Two victims' advocates groups, Vocal Petisi 50 and the National Commission for Missing Person and Victims of the Violence (Kontras), said that the Megawati administration has made a series of deals with influential members of the New Order regime in a bid to maintain power.

"Getting rid of the actors of the New Order is a must" to spearhead reforms, Petisi 50 Secretary Chris Siner Key Timu said in a statement on Saturday.

The Petisi 50 group predicted that, in the absence of the political will to rejuvenate the stalled reform process, there will be systematic efforts to revive the culture of the autocratic New Order regime.

According to group members, an indication of the New Order's newfound influence can be seen in the ongoing erosion of people's quality of life and the crippling of the national economy.

The contemporary Indonesian political scene lacks "the substance and morality needed to attain people's sovereignty," Chris added.

Speaking at a year-end press conference in Jakarta on Friday, Kontras coordinator Ori Rahman criticized the five-month-old Megawati administration as "sacrificing the human rights by creating many controversial political decisions in the effort to maintain country's security and integrity."

Ori referred to Presidential Instruction No. VII/2001, replacing the Instruction No. IV/2001 on the restoration of security and peace in the troubled province of Aceh.

He also noted Presidential Decree No. 229/2001 on the appointment of A.M. Hendropriyono, a controversial military figure with a history tainted by charges of human rights violations, as chief of the National Intelligence Agency.

Ori also sharply criticized the government's policy of quelling rising calls for independence in Iriyan Jaya by promoting violence, which reached its peak with the recent death of Papuan leader Theys Hiyo Eluay.

"The separatist problems in Aceh and Papua cannot be solved by imposing Laws of the Nanggroe Aceh Darusalam (NAD) and Papuan Autonomy," amid demands the government cease "human rights violations and stop any repressive acts," he said.

"The government has failed to show its commitment to seriously processing human rights violations," he continued.

He cited the bloodshed at Tanjung Priok in 1984 and 1999 post- ballot violence in East Timor as two examples. Some Indonesian generals have been named as suspects in the cases, "but, to date, they have never been sent to trial," Ori said.

The investigation of Trisakti and Semanggi, he added, were also cause for concern. In that instance, the House of Representatives took over judicial functions via a special committee, which later said there were no gross human rights violations in the fatal shooting incidents in which 30 young people, mostly students, were killed, according to Ori.

Ori went on to call 2001 the year of terror for human rights activists such as Munir, the former coordinator of Kontras who recently faced a series of bomb threats at his house in Malang, Central Java -- and Johnson Pandjaitan of the Indonesian Legal Aid and Human Rights Association (PBHI), who was recently shot at by a group of unidentified men while riding on his motorcycle.

Several other local figures were not so lucky, he added, pointing to Dayan Dawood, the rector of the Syahkuala University in Banda Aceh and Theys Hiyo Eluay, chairman of the Papuan Presidium Council (PDP) "who were killed by unknown people," Ori said.

Ori added that the government's plan to establish an Antiterrorism Law directly threatens people's basic freedoms, owing to its militaristic language.

Many critics have assailed the bill, widely expected to be enacted into law by the House of Representatives next year, as just another version of the never-ending debate on the first priority of the law -- security for innocent civilians, or the human rights of suspected terrorists.

"The calm situation during Christmas Eve doesn't give any guarantee as to whether the terror will end because the government, as well as the police, have failed to disclose the terrorists" behind last year's Christmas bomb blasts throughout Jakarta, Ori added.