Letter writer Gandhi Sukardi wins award
JAKARTA (JP): How does one feel on entering the record books of the Indonesian Museum of Records (MURI), and having the well- known Jaya Suprana ceremoniously hand an award plaque to you in front of your proud family, close friends and a media contingent?
"Appreciated and very grateful," said Gandhi Sukardi, the happy honoree, during a ceremony on Aug. 22 at the Grand Mahakam Hotel in Kebayoran Baru, Jakarta.
Sukardi, the inveterate letter writer to The Jakarta Post, clocked up 180 published letters in two years and eight months. His letters ranged as wide as the ocean in topic and were as diverse as the colors of the rainbow. Hardly anything topical eluded Sukardi's attention and pen. Yet the letter Sukardi deems the most important is also the most significant in the symbolic sense: his first.
Titled Press freedom, it was published almost three years ago to the day on Aug. 21, 1997. It appeared shortly after The Jakarta Post was taken to task for publishing an article describing a crash involving an aircraft produced by IPTN (Nusantara Aircraft Industry), which is now called Indonesian Aerospace. In short, the paper was sued by the powerful manufacturer.
Sukardi was outraged and expressed his anger in his letter. He launched a daring attack on those responsible for the lawsuit, and appealed to the management of this paper not to capitulate. Most controversial of all, he ended his letter by saying that for the sake of the growth of a "free and responsible press", he was willing to personally serve any jail sentence ordered by the court.
If anyone at IPTN became hot under the collar after reading this letter it was never revealed. And knowing Gandhi Sukardi, neither would he have cared.
Sukardi has always liked challenge in his life. When working for Antara, the national news agency, he was called and reprimanded by his superiors a number of times, but nothing dampened his spirit. He still spoke out in the face of what he saw as injustice and inequity.
"At Antara, because of my English language proficiency, I soon became the head of the English department," Sukardi recalled.
He inherited his love of writing from his father, Didi Sukardi. The elder Sukardi, a nationalist activist, founded in 1926 the newspaper Utusan Indonesia in Yogyakarta.
As for nationalistic fervor, Sukardi claims one of his sons, former Cabinet minister Laksamana Sukardi, inherited this trait from his grandfather.
"Laks and I are very different in temperament. He is very measured, I am impulsive. While Laks considers carefully before saying anything, I shoot from the hip. I like to incite and provoke. If I make mistakes, I am happy to apologize. People say I am more of an entertainer."
He was in fact quite entertaining in his speech, publicly thanking the gathering and drawing as much laughter as Jaya Suprana. His now famous letters, while serious in content, have a lot of humor in them. He has a stable of regular readers, one of whom, according to the Post's editor in chief, is no less than U.S. Ambassador Robert Gelbart.
Sukardi's flair for words is even evident in the names he gave his children. He named his first son Samudera (ocean), so that he would have a mind as broad as the ocean. When a second son was born, he and his wife wanted to make sure the two children would play well together, so he named him Laksamana (admiral). The third son was born in Vienna (or Wina -- as Indonesians call it), so he was named Wina Armada, still very much naval.
Only when the fourth son arrived did he look up from the ocean toward the sky, naming the child Cakrawala (horizon). By the time the fifth son was born, Sukardi's was thinking of time slipping past so quickly, so the baby was named Pancawaktu. After that the couple finally got a daughter. Sukardi's romantic flair, combined with his propensity to look at the universe, led him to name his daughter Pelangi (rainbow).
Sadly, Pelangi only lived for three and a half years. Some friends believed it was all in the name -- rainbows are beautiful but never stay very long.
When Sukardi and his wife were blessed with another son, his sight had returned to earth, so he called him Marcapada (Earth).
Sukardi is now retired, but only from his job. Nothing can suppress the writer in him. Apart from the letters to the Post, which he fully intends to continue producing, Sukardi also writes a regular column for an economic magazine, Capital. Here his writing is much more serious in content.
"Now that I am an award-winning writer," he joked, "I have asked the editor of the magazine to increase my honorarium." The last part was no joke, because he did get a promise of a raise. (Dewi Anggraeni)