MPR building hides romantic stories

The Jakarta administration lists buildings as protected not only based on age, but also according to the history and function of the building. The following article tells the story of a building which has been the site of much of the modern history and romance of Indonesia. It is also one of the few protected buildings in the capital which has been properly cared for. This is the 11th article in The Jakarta Post series on the capital's historic buildings, featured in Saturday editions.

JAKARTA (JP): It is the focus of attention for much of the country these days.

It does not have its unique design to thank for this, but its status as home of the country's political elite, who gather in its halls to discuss and decide the future of the nation. Shortly, this building will witness the election of Indonesia's fourth president.

Yes, we're talking about the House of Representatives/People's Consultative Assembly building on Jl. Gatot Subroto in Central Jakarta, which is listed as one of the capital's protected buildings as stipulated in Gubernatorial Decree No. 475/1993 on Jakarta's Protected Cultural Heritage.

In terms of age, the building is rather young to be a protected historic building since construction on it was completed a mere 26 years before then Jakarta governor Surjadi Soedirdja signed the decree on March 29, 1993.

The most likely reason the building which is now home to the 700 newly elected members of the People's Consultative Assembly (MPR) and the 500-strong House of Representatives (DPR) was given such a status is its distinctive shape and its role as the silent witness to the country's recent glories, disgraces and history.

The first grand ceremony held at the building was the swearing-in ceremony of president Soeharto some 32 years ago.

It was this very same building which was engulfed by a sea of students, activists and people from all walks of life, who came together in May last year to force Soeharto to bring to an end his 32-year reign.

Controversy is no stranger to the MPR/DPR building, which began sparking debate when it was still in the planning stages.

Conefo

Under the orders of the late president Sukarno in March 1965, indigenous Indonesians were invited to submit their bids and designs for the proposed building. One bid was selected and Sukarno ordered construction to begin on a prestigious venue for his Conference of New Emerging Forces, popularly known by the abbreviation Conefo.

Sukarno ordered the civil engineers working on the project to complete construction in no less than 12 months.

He said the design must be superior to the United Nations headquarters in New York and the banquet hall should be more elegant than that of the People's Palace in Beijing.

According to Sukarno, whose daughter Megawati Soekarnoputri is now a leading presidential candidate, the project had to be completed in haste so the building could host the conference for "progressive revolutionary" countries, political jargon for socialist and "pro-Communist" nations.

Sukarno said it was urgent that Conefo be held the following year.

All of these events date back to early 1965, when Sukarno announced the need to establish an international body comprised of newly independent and emerging nations in Asia, Africa and Latin America. The new organization was viewed as a counterforce to the UN, which Sukarno considered to be dominated by the United States and its Western allies and deaf to the aspirations of newly independent countries.

Five years earlier, Sukarno withdrew Indonesia from the UN after Malaysia was admitted to the UN Security Council.

The main impediment to realizing Conefo in a year's time was the monetary crisis which Indonesia was suffering through at the time.

Although Sukarno ordered the building completed "at any cost", the engineers realized most of the construction materials had to be purchased and shipped from overseas, a difficult task during that time of continued inflation.

A groundbreaking ceremony was held at the 64-hectare plot of hilly forest land in the vast Senayan complex on April 19, 1965.

A number of leaders from "progressive revolutionary" countries were invited to attend the ceremony, a testament to Sukarno's ambition which would turn into a Herculean task for the engineers and 27,000 laborers.

Guests included premier Zhou Enlai of China, prime minister Kim Il-sung of North Korea and Prince Norodom Sihanouk of Cambodia.

Snake nests

One of the civil engineers involved in the project, E.D. Tangkudung, noted that at least 45,000 cubic meters of earth had to be removed from the site in a two-week period during the rainy season of March to April 1965 to allow Sukarno to hold his groundbreaking ceremony.

Some of the tractors which had operated 24 hours a day could be seen trapped in the mud, he said.

"It was still a densely forested area. One of the hills was four meters high ... it was also home to numerous snake nests," Tangkudung recalled.

A number of foreign architects doubted construction on the building could be finished within 12 months.

A funny episode occurred in the early days of the building's construction. Experts in Spain, who were calculating the strength of the construction works by computers, and experts in Germany who had been hired to make a scale model, were stunned when they were informed that the foundation of the Conefo building had been laid.

"They were surprised," recalled Noerpontjo, then a young architect who was assisting Sujudi and Sutami, the two engineers who were entrusted by Sukarno to design the building.

As has been widely documented, the skepticism of many people, including foreign architects, was well founded. The building could not be finished on schedule, even with Sukarno constantly hovering overhead in a helicopter inspecting the work.

Construction was postponed following the abortive coup by the Indonesian Communist Party in September 1965.

At the time, the foundation and frame had been completed and the assembly hall was nearing completion.

It was Soeharto, after taking over the presidency from Sukarno, who instructed work on the building resume in 1967. Only now the building was not to serve as the site for Conefo, but it was to house the country's highest legislative body.

It remains unclear why the planned underground shopping and office arcade and a bridge that resembled the Semanggi cloverleaf were never realized.

A bra

In the early days after its completion, there was a race to christen the distinctive and first modern building in Indonesia.

A number of people remarked that the building resembled a bra. Others accused the architects of copying the Berlin Stadthaus congress hall, noting that Sujudi studied in Germany.

At a glance, the buildings in Senayan and Berlin share some similarities, particularly their mammoth domes. The difference is that the concrete roof in Jakarta is supported in the middle by a pair of arched beams, not at the edge as is the case with the building in Berlin.

According to Noerpontjo, the spherical shape of the roof was designed by accident when he -- making a model of the dome -- casually made an oval mold whose middle he pried open, giving it the appearance of a shell. Sujudi gave his wholehearted approval for this design.

Some see the dome as having the shape of two half-shells cantilevered with the beams in the middle, which seen all together resemble the wings of a giant bird in flight.

During the occupation of the building's compound by antigovernment protesters in May 1998, the roof of the building -- for the first in its history -- was clambered upon by dozens of visitors.

The building might have something special in store for President B.J. Habibie in the coming days as the country's history continues to be made here.

So, let's see what the building holds for Habibie this Wednesday. (bsr)