Pakpahan, Budiman trials starts

Pakpahan, Budiman trials starts

JAKARTA (JP): The first sessions of trials charging 10
activists with subversion against the state went smoothly
yesterday, but raised eyebrows for failing to refer to previous
allegations that the activists had masterminded the July 27
riots.

Despite the presence of hundreds of military and police, no
strict security measures were applied when Budiman Sudjatmiko,
leader of the now outlawed Democratic People's Party (PRD), his
eight colleagues and prominent labor unionist Muchtar Pakpahan
were tried simultaneously in two different district courts
yesterday.

Budiman, Garda Sembiring, Suroso, Ignatius Pranowo and Yakobus
Eko Kurniawan were tried in the Central Jakarta District Court,
while the trials of Muchtar, Petrus Hariyanto, Ken Budha
Kusumandaru, Victor da Costa and I Putut Arintoko proceeded 15
kilometers away at the South Jakarta District Court.

Prosecutors read the defendants similar accusations of "having
committed a series of activities in the past two years which
could either upset, digress or undermine the state ideology of
Pancasila."

Under Indonesia's colonial-legacy Subversion Law, the charge
carries a maximum penalty of death.

A throng of activists, diplomats from Canada, the United
States, and Australia, an official from the International
Confederation of Free Trade Unions, plain clothes officers and
curious people packed the courtrooms during the hearings which
received full media coverage.

Budiman, 26, stole the limelight during the hearings held in
Central Jakarta. Wearing a white shirt, a fresh looking Budiman
listened calmly to prosecutor Mohammad Salim in the trial
presided over by Judge Syoffinan Sumantri, which lasted more than
an hour.

Salim unveiled evidence ranging from Budiman and his friends'
failure to specify the Pancasila as the PRD's ideology, their
involvement in several labor demonstrations, and other activities
in quest of the abolition of the 1985 laws on politics and the
Armed Forces' socio-political function known as dwi fungsi.

No riot link

The prosecutor, however, said nothing about Budiman or his
friends direct involvement in the July 27 riots. Nor did Salim
mention a word about "communism," the banned ideology previously
pinned on the PRD by the authorities.

The riots broke out on Jl. Diponegoro, Central Jakarta,
following the forced take-over of the Indonesian Democratic
Party's headquarters there. At least four people died, 23 are
still missing and 124 were injured in the riots.

Soon after the riots, the authorities accused Budiman and his
friends of being behind the unrest.

"On July 27 the defendant and other PRD activists were among
the masses involved in the riots around Jalan Diponegoro," was
all that Salim said about Budiman and his colleagues' role in the
unrest.

Budiman and his friends were arrested in August.

Budiman told Judge Syoffinan, who had to repeat the question
three times, that he did not understand the charge.

"I understand the language (of the charges) but I don't
understand the substance," Budiman said after a brief explanation
of the charges from his defense lawyers.

One of the lawyers, Luhut Pangaribuan, said his client did
nothing wrong other than express his ideas, an act that is lawful
in the light of the 1945 Constitution.

"He did not conduct an armed rebellion, the trial is likely to
seek justification, not the truth," he said.

At South Jakarta District Court, prosecutor R. Moekiat accused
Pakpahan of making a number of subversive and anti-government
statements, such as "a people power revolution will prevail if a
constitutional reform fails."

Moekiat also said that 43-year-old Pakpahan, leader of the
unrecognized Indonesian Prosperous Labor Union (SBSI), has spread
hatred against the government in a book he wrote and in other
statements made between August 1995 and July 27, 1996.

The indictment said subversive remarks were also made during a
speech at a Portuguese university in February and during an
interview with Dutch television NOVA in July this year at his
home.

"The defendant made his remarks which he knew or should have
known could overturn, damage or undermine the authority of the
state and its legal apparatus," Moekiat told the court.

The indictment quoted an incriminating statement released by
SBSI on July 1996, signed by Pakpahan, protesting the
government's meddling with PDI's internal affairs by engineering
a rebel party congress a month earlier in Medan, North Sumatra.

Another Pakpahan statement which directly connected him with
the July 27 riots was an SBSI release on the chronology of the
riots. The document accused the military and government-backed
PDI chairman Soerjadi of using hoodlums to take over the PDI
headquarters.

All the trials will resume next Thursday. (08/amd)