Parent to sue over death of son at ITB

Parent to sue over death of son at ITB

BANDUNG (JP): The parents of Zaki Tiffany Lazuardian will press charges against those they consider responsible for the death of their 18-year-old son during initiation week at the prestigious Bandung Institute of Technology (ITB).

Zaki's father, Amir Hamzah, told The Jakarta Post here yesterday that he would file charges as soon as the ruckus caused by the death has subsided.

He would not reveal who would be sued. However, he did say that if his car was hit by someone who was driving a borrowed car, then the one who should be sued is the driver of the car rather than the owner.

Zaki died on Jan. 8 after taking part in a rough 12-day student initiation program organized by the Association of Students of Department of Physics (Himafi).

Two key executive members of Himafi, Muhammad Ridjal and Budi Sumarso, have recently been expelled by the ITB administration.

Amir Hamzah said he did not want to proceed with the planned legal suit now because he did not want to distract the ITB administration from its current campaign to banish initiation programs in the other departments.

Initiation week, which often features strenuous physical exercises, continue to survive in a number of universities despite a government ban several years ago. The government allowed in its place a program called campus orientation activities, which mostly contain seminars or speeches.

Separately, other parents whose children were also "victims" of the initiation reproached the program's activists.

Those ITB students are "hypocrites"; they often demonstrate and campaign for human rights but fail to treat their fellow students with dignity during the initiation week, one of the parents said. (17/mds)