Purged from IKIP

Purged from IKIP

On June 1, 2000, I wrote a letter to the chairman of the
National Commission on Human Rights (Komnas HAM) about action
taken against me and my colleagues -- eleven persons in all -- by
the then chairperson of the presidium of the Jakarta Teachers
Training Institute (IKIP Jakarta), now State University of
Jakarta, Prof. Dr. Hj. Maftuchah Jusuf, along with members of the
institute's screening committee and students council. The act was
obviously a violation of the law and of human rights: Maftuchah
Jusuf and her group suspended us as civil servants for 11 years,
from April 1, 1966 through March 31 1977.

All of us -- the institute's employees, lecturers and
lecturers' assistants -- belonged to the nationalist camp
(PNI/GMNI/KBM) and very clearly were not members of a banned
party. Besides being suspended, we also had to put up with being
labeled not free from leftist influence for the entire 32 years
of the New Order era under Soeharto. In addition, Maftuchah Jusuf
and her clique also discharged 41 students and suspended 36
others without any legal or court procedures.

As a result, we could neither teach nor do anything else in
our own society. The act put a stop to our career as civil
servants, even in our own institute. Besides, morally and
materially we were all belittled and this belittlement was also
borne by our families. In other words, this act downgraded our
self-respect and dignity as God's creatures and citizens in our
own country.

Readers must well understand the plight of people like us,
just like the plight of Bung Karno's family members. Firing
students from a teachers' training institute is very cruel, an
act violating all the teachings of God the Almighty and the
five-point principles of Pancasila. It must go down in the
history of the nation that IKIP Jakarta belongs to the category
of institutions that were most cruel when implementing the cruel
policies of the New Order regime.

Ironically, some of these violators of human rights are still
free to stay on the campus and hold positions there. When the
intensity of the reform movement was at its greatest, they also
unashamedly condemned Soeharto in front of thousands of rallying
students on IKIP Jakarta's campus. In fact, they had enjoyed the
positions handed to them by the New Order administration and
practiced the cruelty of the New Order regime on the campus.

So, speaking for myself and on behalf of my colleagues as
referred to above, I earnestly hope that state minister for human
rights affairs will include in the forthcoming book on human
rights education the cruel legal and human rights violations
perpetrated by educational institutions in Indonesia during the
New Order era. Details of these violations must also be included.
Therefore, I have asked members of the Komnas HAM to help monitor
and pay attention to this noble project.

Last but not least, in the pursuit of national unity, we all
wish to see national reconciliation coupled with legal action
against those have committed mistakes and compensation to be
extended to the victims. Sticking closely to our conviction in
God the Almighty, we must get rid of any desire for revenge. In
this way the younger generation will learn from us and never
commit the same mistakes in the future.

RAHARDJO PURWOSUDIRDJO

Chief lecturer

Department of Economics,

School of Social Sciences,

State University of Jakarta