May riot victims yearn for justice after five years

Tertiani ZB Simanjuntak, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

Five years is not enough to heal the wounds of the victims of the May 13 and May 14 riots, which paralyzed the capital and other cities and took more than 1,200 lives across the country, as no one has been named a suspect nor has anyone been held responsible for the tragedy.

Although the National Commission on Human Rights (Komnas HAM) has investigated into the tragedy, has concluded that the state had violated the people's rights and has declared that it would bring the perpetrators to court, the victims are skeptical.

Santi Parhusip, who was sexually assaulted by a group of men wearing long-sleeved shirts while trying to save her father's shop in Perniagaan market, West Jakarta, from looters and fire, said she was not optimistic that there would ever be a trial.

"We've seen three presidents in the last five years, but we have never heard a formal apology made to the victims. Without the political will of the government, Komnas HAM's work would come to nothing," she said on Monday.

Santi, who now works for the Indonesian Justice Fellowship (JFI), which advocates for the victims of violations by the state, including the 1965 massacres, spoke at a discussion on seeking justice for victims of the May riots.

The skepticism is not without reason. Although Komnas HAM has yet to summon military officers in charge of security at that time, the military's legal officials have already declared that none of the officers would appear.

In the two-day nightmare -- which followed the shooting of four Trisakti University students who were taking part in a nationwide rally to demand the resignation of authoritarian ruler Soeharto -- hundreds of shops, shopping centers and homes were looted and set ablaze.

No state security officers were around to prevent the crimes, except for those hired by business owners to guard their assets before the rampage even started. This peculiar fact strengthened the suspicions of many that the riots were part of a conspiracy among those in power to quash the people's movement.

Soeharto eventually resigned on May 21 and was succeeded by his vice president, B.J. Habibie.

The riots, which were fueled by anti-Chinese sentiment, claimed a total of 1,217 lives, according to the Volunteer Team for Humanity.

The tally was confirmed by a fact-finding team led by former Komnas HAM deputy chairman Marzuki Darusman. The team also discovered that at least 66 women, mostly of Chinese ethnicity, were raped.

Although the team submitted the findings to Habibie's administration, no measures were taken.

It was during the 2001 World Conference Against Racism in South Africa that Minister of Justice and Human Rights Yusril Ihza Mahendra admitted that the May riots was a violation of human rights.

The same year, the House of Representatives halted its inquiry into who should be held responsible in the Trisakti shootings, arguing that the riots that ensued -- which also took place in Medan and Surakarta -- were not connected to the incident.

The House later concluded that there was no case of human rights violations in the Trisakti shootings or in two similar incidents involving security forces shooting at student demonstrators and civilians near the Semanggi cloverleaf on Nov. 13, 1998 and Sept. 24, 1999.