Human rights and justice

About one month short of a year after a passerby chanced upon her horribly mutilated body lying in a deserted spot in a rice field in East Java, the ghost of Marsinah continues to haunt this nation's conscience with unabated vindictiveness. A few questions concerning the case appear to have been answered during the trials of the past weeks in Surabaya and Sidoarjo, but the answers to many more remain a mystery.

Now, in the latest turn of developments surrounding the Marsinah case, the National Commission on Human Rights appears to have confirmed suspicions of foul play. In what is easily its most critical statement so far, the Commission says it has found irregularities in the way the suspects were arrested and treated. It is urging the authorities to look into the charges and to punish the parties responsible.

A number of points mentioned in the Commission's cautiously phrased statement deserve our attention. First, the Commission says it has found indications of "various forms of torture, physical and mental." Second, it has found evidence of unwarranted intervention by the local military agency in the affairs of PT Citra Putra Surya. Third, the Commission says "other people" than those already arrested and tried were possibly involved in the murder of the 23-year-old labor activist and suggests that the authorities look into the matter.

Clearly, the Commission's unexpected findings can help shed at least a bit more light on this national cause celebre and clear up some of the questions that linger. On the other hand, the paper somehow serves to place a perhaps unintended emphasis on some of the more disturbing aspects of the case. What do the Commission's findings mean?

Quite evidently, the 23-year-old factory worker was targeted because she was a nuisance to her employers. That this is a case of murder is also quite obvious, considering the ghastly wounds and bruises that were found on her body. But who actually ordered the murder and who raised the hand that killed her? How was she killed, and where? And if a plot was involved, who took part in the conspiracy?

Sure, all of those questions were apparently answered during either the interrogations or during the trial of the nine suspects presented by the authorities. But what is one to believe when almost all of them later retracted their statements on the grounds that they were extracted by torture? Why have all of the judges been so stubborn in refusing to listen to complaints of torture and in insisting on basing their judgments only on the written confessions obtained during the pre-trial procedures?

Surely, one of the most disturbing questions which the Commission's findings raises is this: If all, or even some, of the earlier charges of torture and coercion were true, then why has it been so tough for the defendants, the witnesses, the defense lawyers and the lawyers of the Legal Aid Institute to persuade the courts to re-examine the facts?

In view of all these allegations -- assuming for now that this is what they are -- of foul play, we believe it would only serve to bolster the prestige of this country's judiciary if its authorities would at least lend an ear to those charges.

As Napoleon once said, there can be no authority without justice.

As for the unexpected statement of the Commission on Human Rights, it surely disproves the skepticism which many observers have accorded it since its foundation. We do believe that some important strides have been made lately in the improvement of human rights in this country. Let us hope that this new spirit will also touch all of those entrusted with bringing light to the actual events surrounding Marsinah's death. Certainly we believe that a simple re-examination of the facts in the case is not too much to ask for if the meting out of justice is our concern.