Indonesian independence: It is all in the name

Teuku Faizasyah, Department of Political Science and Public Policy, University of Waikato, Hamilton, New Zealand

What is in a name? asked Shakespeare. Although knowing that each name is unique and carries its own meaning, a phone call from a friend Alamsyah on Aug. 17 struck me how meaningful his name is.

When he wished Indonesia a happy Independence Day, I initially thought he was simply trying to soothe his homesickness.

However, I eventually realized how meaningful Indonesia's Independence Day was for him. It is his name, he said, that attaches him emotionally with Independence Day. His late father Abdul Salam gave him the name Alamsyah to praise God for His blessing in granting Indonesians legitimate freedom.

Abdul Salam is an ordinary Indonesian name. But Abdul Salam spent 17 years of his life in the notorious political prison of Boven Digul in Irian Jaya. And, as narrated by Alamsyah, Abdul Salam's cellmate, at one time, was Bung Hatta, one of the country's founding fathers.

When the Japanese invaded the archipelago, his father and some other "Digulis" escaped to Australia. After Sukarno and Mohammad Hatta declared independence in 1945, Abdul Salam was among the first Indonesians to return home from Australia. He returned to his hometown, Surakarta (Sala), and started a new life as a chemist. He was no longer interested in politics after his long years of imprisonment in Digul.

For me, the Digul affair seems part of the distant past. Maybe, I thought, I am just like most Indonesians, who in the eyes of novelist Pramudya Ananta Toer, happen to have a short memory.

When Alamsyah asked me what independence meant to me, it took me a while before asking back, instead of responding, what it meant to him.

In his lengthy answer he said independence provides Indonesians with the opportunity to enhance their quality of humanism. He also opined that with their freedom from oppression, Indonesians are now blessed with a greater chance to enrich their knowledge and soul.

After 57 years of independence, are we more humane? If our quality of humanism has increased over the years, how come we have allowed our fellow citizens in Maluku and Poso, Central Sulawesi, for instance, to become trapped in a cycle of hatred?

Once, my history teacher said that Indonesians of different ethnic groups, religious backgrounds, social strata and walks of life were all united in defending independence from the Dutch military incursion. Why does it seem very difficult nowadays to see our diversity as a unifying force? What went wrong with our nation-building? Can we convincingly say that Indonesia is one nation and no longer an "imagined community" as suggested by scholar Benedict Anderson?

Have we benefited from independence to enrich our knowledge and heart? Perhaps we have been too busy enriching ourselves, and in the process our hearts have hardened. It seems we have difficulty empathizing with the suffering of those at the bottom of our society.

The declaration of independence was pronounced after our founding fathers found that Japan had surrendered to the Allied Forces. Hence, while we know that knowledge is power, many Indonesians today remain unable to acquire even basic knowledge and education. And since the 1997 financial crisis, many of our children have not been able to afford basic education, not to mention tertiary education, which is still a luxury for most Indonesians.

Does materialism obsess us? Perhaps we are lacking a role model who could show us how dignified being modest is. In today's Indonesia, we are nobody unless we are wearing brand name clothes, driving a luxury car and being extravagant. No wonder the first thing our politicians discuss is how to increase their income.

On the phone, I tried to impress Alamsyah with a positive note about Indonesia's state of affairs, but I am not sure whether I was successful or not. Having spent more than 20 years of his life in New Zealand does not mean Alamsyah is ignorant about the realities back home. He informs himself of the news in Indonesia on the Internet and discusses the news with Indonesian students in Hamilton.

Although I did not answer his question on the phone, I did say to him that I have faith that Indonesians will strive for the best and that the nation will survive. Being colonized for more than 300 years did not stop our forefathers from hoping that one day they would be masters of their own home and destiny.

However, our forefathers, just like Abdul Salam, did not stop hoping and dreaming. They had tried at all costs to win independence and they were successful.

I also shared my similar belief that Indonesia's younger generation would always hope and give their utmost to rebuild the nation, even if it takes a generation to achieve this vision.

That evening I went to bed with the question: What does independence really mean to me? It might help if I had a name related to the birth of our nation, but in any case, Alamsyah had already provoked me with the thought that perhaps my generation might also be interested in finding the answer.