Marwah

By Syofiardi Bachyul Jb

A village in the north, in common with villages in the eastern parts of this region, is one where security prevails through the strong grip of fear. Life has to go on as usual, but at any time - nobody knows when - some local residents can always be taken away by the soldiers. Some will be tortured but most will be killed right away. Their bodies will be dumped onto unasphalted roads with thick layers of dust on them, or on the sides of the narrow, potholed inter-provincial road.

Corpses are scattered at roadsides and local people, who cover them with banana leaves or old newspapers, will stop passing cars to ask for burial donations. These locals knows full well when some of them must be killed while the government and the military authorities tell them that their daily lives have to proceed as usual, as if nothing had happened.

In a manner resembling a secret agreement of the Last Trumpet, it was now the turn of Iskandar's house. It was very early in the morning when soldiers marched down a pebbled village road.

They encircled a wooden stilt house with a cement staircase. Some of them went up the stairs right away and with full force battered at the main door several times before it finally gave way and collapsed. Iskandar was woken up. Acting on impulse, he grabbed from the wall his rencong, a dagger with a curved handle peculiar to the Acehnese, and hurried out of the bedroom. He stopped, speechless, in the middle room, as he saw three soldiers in their battle fatigues were circling around just like eagles eying their prey.

Stepping carefully, with great tension and without saying anything, they approached Iskandar. The faces under the steel helmets reflected darkness, hatred and a strong desire to kill. The bayonets attached to their F-16 guns, clutched at the ready, getting closer and closer to Iskandar, now trembling with his rencong still in its sheath.

"Whhaaat have I done, sir?" Iskandar, a farmer in his early fifties, stuttered in deep shock.

The soldier on the left glanced at his colleague in the middle. This one, his face stern and hard, said in his booming voice:

"Death to you, rebels' accomplice!"

This condemnation was immediately followed by the firing of guns, the sound of which broke the silence and peace of the morning. Then, this emaciated man, given no chance to groan out of pain or make any movement, was blown backwards by the bullets fired at him at close range. He landed on a plaited pandanus mat spread in the corner of the room. Blood spurted from his body and his head, leaving bubbles like boiling porridge. The mat was covered with fresh blood. This blood also covered the floor and made its way through spaces between the wooden planks forming the floor. Drops of it fell onto the handle of the plow that Iskandar kept neatly in the space below the house.

The soldiers did not care. They proceeded with their raid. Fully alert, they checked the two rooms in the house. Empty. But, as one of them was moving into the door of the kitchen, a middle- aged woman, Iskandar's wife, rushed into the middle room to find her husband's body. Unfortunately, this soldier put out one of his legs. The fragile feet of this elderly woman snagged on his leg, making her lose her balance and sending her sliding, head first, on the slippery floor.

She stopped only when her head hit the hard, sharp corner of the wooden frame of the door. Close by were the feet of another soldier. She tried to get up and crawl. But, then she fell, face down, in front of the feet of the soldier and uttered the name of God. With one foot, the soldier stamped on the head of the elderly woman. With a cracking sound, it split.

There are only eight stilt houses in this village. They are quite a distance from one another, located amid tall coconut trees with leaves freely flowing down, and other leafy trees. Any suspicious sound in one of the houses will draw the attention of the neighbors. The door was forced open, there was the sound of guns, and then a number of villagers carefully approached the source of the sounds.

Unfortunately, the soldiers detained them in the front yard of Iskandar's house. They were closely watched and could only guess what was really happening to the Iskandars. They stopped guessing when a soldier dragged, or more appropriately lifted, an eight- year-old boy from the back of the house.

The boy, Ibrahim, was Iskandar's younger child. He was arrested while taking his cows out of the shed. Ibrahim, lifted up by the hair, was struggling in pain but the soldier simply ignored his protest and took him to his commander. He handed the boy over to the commander and told him who the boy was.

"Do you know the whereabouts of your elder sister, Ucok?" the commander asked him in a loud voice.

Ibrahim seemed to be thinking hard and stole a glance inside the house.

"What are you looking at in the house? She is not there. You can find inside only the dead bodies of your parents, the rebels, you know? Where is Marwah?"

Ibrahim did not answer. He could only sob, calling his parents.

The commander was going to interrogate Ibrahim further when one of his men appeared dragging a girl from the back of the house. She was Marwah, Iskandar's elder child. She had just completed her studies at MAN 1) in the district capital. Marwah was wrapping a wet piece of batik cloth round her body, the curves of which were clearly visible below. Her straight black hair flowed on to her shoulders and back. Her brownish skin, the color usually found among those of Indian or Malay extraction, was shiny against the morning light. She was almost as tall as the soldier seizing her by the arms and slender body. She was having a bath near the well at the back of the house when a soldier spotted her and arrested her.

"What have I done wrong, sir?" she asked, weakly. Her fear was mixed with surprise. Once she glanced at the fallen door to the house. Her heart missed a beat, again and again.

"You are an informer of GPK 2)! Now, show us their hiding place!" the commander shouted at her cynically. He held Marwah's chin rudely and pulled the girl's face close to his.

"Now, answer!"

"I... I don't know anything, sir. I don't understand what you mean!" she said in a piteous voice. She was still trying to glance at the house.

The commander pushed her chin roughly. The girl fell to the ground. The interrogation was continued, this time by his subordinates. Still, the girl did not provide any information. The soldiers were apparently very upset by Marwah's stubbornness. They really lost their tempers and boiling anger easily led to sadism.

Suddenly the commander ordered his men to set fire to the stilt house. In a matter of minutes, the house was ablaze. Marwah and Ibrahim called their parents hysterically and some soldiers prevented her from running into the burning house. Some local people, by then moving restlessly while chanting prayers and praises to God the Almighty, were stopped by guns at the ready.

"Now, you all look at that house. We will not hesitate to burn houses and even bodies, just as in the case of this rebel family, if any of you dare to cooperate with GPK. Remember this!" the commander said tersely, his eyes looking around at rows of local people seething with pent-up anger. He acted as if he was putting on a performance in a boy scouts' camp fire event, giving the impression that he was just play acting.

The house was burned to the ground in less than an hour. The morning sun had sent its rays from behind the trees and the locals' houses. These had a coppery red color. The air heated by the burning of the house had now gradually become normal again. And the soldiers again had to deal with Marwah. She was sitting feebly on the ground. She could not get up - her legs were too weak for that. Yet the soldiers rudely ordered her to stand up. Again she was interrogated.

Similar questions were asked. Although the soldiers knew full well the character traits of the local people, their fellow countrymen, these locals refused to give up. It has gone down in gold ink in the annals of national history that the ancestors of these people were very heroic and resolutely determined people ready to give up their lives for the sake of their dignity and self respect.

However, the soldiers always thought: Is there a human being who can endure inhuman torture? War is quite different from peace. To shed blood is easier than to utter words. He who refuses to speak will lose his blood. So, Marwah, remaining silent, had to be subjected to this cruel torture.

The cloth wrapped around Marwah's body suddenly came loose at one go when the commander pulled at it roughly and strongly. The cloth, now just a lump, was thrown into the debris of the house. Marwah was stark naked now and the soldiers feasted their eyes on her nakedness. The girl tried to cover her genitals with both hands. She cried, begging for mercy and hoping that her torturers would show her some kindness. Yet, the cry fell on deaf ears. The soldiers were not in the least touched by the girl's imploring plea. Her efforts to induce some kindness came to no avail. She was but the representation of the sadness of a weak human being before hungry lions which would soon devour her.

The locals, Marwah's neighbors or relatives, felt insulted upon seeing one of them undergo such a torture. They also felt they were belittled by this incident. Yet, they could only stand with heads bowed in the face of the muzzles of the soldiers' rifles. Tears streamed down their cheeks. They could only pray for the girl's safety and their own.

Unfortunately, there was more that they had to undergo. The commander ordered the local people - men and women - to get close to Marwah, forming a circle round the girl, who was trembling out of shame and anger. They were ordered to sit cross-legged on the ground and stare at the body of the unfortunate and tortured girl. These helpless locals could only pray.

After the soldiers were satisfied, they ordered the locals to move away. Then they took Marwah, still naked, away along the pebbled village path to a military camp some 8 km away. Marwah's heart was completely broken because of the great shame caused by this inhuman insult. She had no idea when all this would end.

The disaster that had befallen Marwah and his family was caused by an incident that had happened a day earlier. A military post not far from Marwah's village was attacked by armed GAM 4 guerrillas. Three soldiers were killed and some others wounded. Scores of rifles and many boxes of ammunition were seized. The attackers then disappeared.

A cuak, a local informer working for the military, called Dajal was immediately called to report to the military commander overseeing the village. He wanted Dajal to tell him about locals recruited as informers of the GPK. He argued that it would have been impossible for the attackers to successfully assault a military post if they had not received information from among the locals.

"Dajal, what can you tell me about the accomplices of GPK in the villages in connection with the recent attack?"

Dajal, not yet 25 years old, thought for a moment, trying to put together pieces of information he had about these people.

"Marwah, sir," he said in a tone of certainty.

"Who's she?" the commander asked, knitting his brow.

"A girl, sir. She has just graduated from MAN in the district capital. Before the attack, she was often seen passing the post. Once she even dropped in to have a talk with one of her friends, a soldier on duty at the post, sir."

"Then?"

"Some of my men have told me that Marwah is suspect. One of her school friends said that while still at school she showed some sympathy for the GPK. His family was also sympathetic toward GPK. Once her father took care of a wounded GPK member. That was last year. I have reported this to you, sir. However, before soldiers got to her house, the GPK member and all Iskandar's family had gone."

"Then?"

"Obviously, Marwah and her family are accomplices of GPK. If you do not destroy them now, a similar attack will happen again. You mustn't hesitate, sir. Marwah is quite pretty. I can tell you only that much, sir."

The commander was very much reliant on information from a cuak like Dajal. He was himself a soldier and could not therefore easily get close to the locals to ferret out information, especially about GPK. There was always a distance separating the soldiers and the locals and this rendered ineffective anything that the soldiers ever did.

They always ignored the desires of the local people to improve their lives. Soldiers came and went. They all acted in the fashion of rulers. Not infrequently did they act as if they were colonial rulers. Cuak were the soldiers' compasses. And the soldiers never cared what the locals thought of their presence.

As soon as he had ferreted out as much information as possible about the Iskandars, the commander right away took his men to apprehend Iskandar and his daughter, Marwah, dead or alive. The commander boiled over with anger when he remembered that the rebels had killed and wounded some of his men. Likewise, his men were seething with rage because some of their comrades-in-arms had been either killed or wounded. Revenge burned in their eyes. They did not want the attack by the rebels to recur. The masterminds had to be exterminated.

So, at the crack of the dawn, the soldiers, all overpowered by a desire for revenge, moved towards their target.6)

"Is it true that Marwah is an informer of GAM and was involved?" a representative of Kontras 7) asked the reporting witness claiming to be a former friend of Dajal one afternoon.

Domestic and foreign media reporters present at the office of the Legal Aid Institute (LBH) that afternoon, all getting ready with their tape recorders and pens and notebooks, were awaiting the reply.

"Not at all, sir. Marwah once refused to accept Dajal's expression of love. As he was persistent, Marwah came up with an argument that she would agree to accept Dajal's love if her father gave his approval. So Dajal went to see Iskandar's family. Unfortunately, he was not allowed in. Everybody knows that Dajal is a cuak and none of the villagers likes him. Everybody is hostile to him. However, as he is an underling of the occupying soldiers, the local people are afraid of him. This incident was clearly Dajal's revenge. He himself has said so to me. But I was not involved, sir. I am only his friend to confide in. In fact, the longer I know him the less I like him. He is indeed a dajal, a devil incarnate.

"So what eventually happened to Marwah?"

"Three days after the arrest, her body was thrown in front of the debris of the house. She was still stark naked. She was killed with bullets in the head. For three days before she was killed, so Dajal told me, Marwah was tortured and gang-raped. And Dajal himself felt satisfied after he had his share in this gang rape, a revenge on Marwah for refusing to accept his love. Kuala Simpang, 1993

Padang, February 12, 1999

Translated by Lie Hua

Notes:

1) MAN, a state Islamic senior high school

2) GPK, Security-Disturbing Movement, a term used by the government and the Armed Forces to refer to the armed struggle waged by a number of Acehnese aspiring to an independent Aceh.

3) A similar incident happened to a woman called Podi. In the case of Podi, she was shot in the head with her fellow villagers making a circle round her being forced to watch the murder. The incident was reported by Muhammad Nur in his testimony at YLBHI (the Legal-Aid Institute Foundation) Jakarta, early August 1998 (Aksi, Vol. 2, No. 90, Aug. 4 - 10 1998, p. 11).

4) GAM, the Free Aceh Movement. A number of Acehnese wishing to establish a government separate from the Republic of Indonesia. The establishment of this movement was prompted by dissatisfaction with the New Order administration (read: the Soeharto order), which was considered the regime of "Atheistic Javanese Indonesia and Polytheistic Pancasila" (Adil, No. 51, volume 66, Sept. 23 - 29, 1998, p. 20).

5) Cuak, a reference to the accomplices of the military authorities during the period of DOM (Military Operation Region) in the Aceh Special Region.

6) This story has to be retold in a more flexible style of fiction because the witness related his testimony in a manner too dull for a short story.

7) Kontras, Committee for Missing Persons and Victims of Violence. This committee is more popular than the National Commission on Human Rights. It has seriously and perseveringly made efforts to track down missing people and take care of victims of violence, generally perpetrated, as it turns out, by the police and soldiers.