Judge cautions military over communist hunt

Judge cautions military over communist hunt

JAKARTA (JP): Justice Bismar Siregar, a leading member of the
Supreme Court, cautioned the Armed Forces (ABRI) yesterday about
the naming of three men as being involved in communist-like
activities.

Bismar said that if the authorities have sufficient data to
support their allegations, they should take action.

"There are legal procedures (for that)," he added.

However, if the naming of the people was based only on
suspicion, "my heart cries out", he said.

Saying that a person is involved in certain illegal activities
or organizations on the basis of mere suspicion was a common
practice in Indonesia in the early 1960s, he said.

"Husbands were suspicious of their wives, children suspected
their parents," he said.

He recalled that his family also felt the pressure at the
time. "I was one of the people most despised by the communists,"
he added.

"This must never happen again," said Bismar, who will retire
from the bench on Dec. 1.

He was commenting on the announcement on Monday by ABRI chief
of general affairs, Lt. Gen. Soeyono, that author Pramoedya
Ananta Toer, scholar George Aditjondro and labor leader Muchtar
Pakpahan were behind Indonesia's much-talked-about "formless
organizations".

President Soeharto and other senior government and military
officials earlier blamed some of the recent social unrest on
"formless organizations" whose acts of provocation bore the
hallmarks of the long-outlawed Indonesian Communist Party (PKI).

In the 1960s Pramoedya was leader of Lekra, a cultural
organization associated with the PKI. Last month, he received the
Magsaysay award for literature.

George, an academic from Satya Wacana Christian University in
Salatiga, Central Java, is currently conducting research in
Australia. Both he and Muchtar, a leader of the unrecognized
Indonesian Prosperous Labor Union, have denied being communists.

Besides accusing Muchtar of communism, Soeyono said that
Muchtar's father led a PKI-sponsored workers' strike in North
Sumatra in the 1960s which turned into a riot.

Bismar cautioned against accusing people of being communists
solely on the basis of family ties.

"Islam does not recognize hereditary sins," he said.

"The communist party is now a devil, and the only way to fight
devils is to build one's faith in God," he said. "Mutual
suspicion is not characteristic of faithful people."

Being alert is a different matter, he added.

Minister of Justice Oetojo Oesman said yesterday that he,
personally, thought that publicly naming the three men had been
unnecessary.

"We must be on the alert, but that does not mean there is a
ghost behind every tree," he said.

Oetojo declined to comment on whether the statements
represented a breach of the principle of the presumption of
innocence.

"Their names should not have been mentioned...But that is not
only a legal matter," he said. "It is also a matter of security."

"There may be parties working to confront the state...The
public has a right to be protected," he said.

Oetojo stressed that the phrase "formless organizations" was
not a recent invention.

The term came from PKI documents produced after the party went
underground in 1966, he said.

The phrase meant that PKI members should continue to be active
even though the organization had been banned, he added.

Former chief justice Purwoto Gandasubrata, asked to comment on
Soeyono's statement, said it was more of a political than a legal
issue.

"I do not know if he (Soeyono) intended to give a warning," he
said. He added that, legally speaking, the people concerned could
file a complaint if they felt that the accusations had damaged
their reputations. (anr)