Remember the 'Red Dragon'

Remember the 'Red Dragon'

Exactly six years ago, on July 27, 1996, the Indonesian Armed
Forces (ABRI) masterminded an attack, code named the Red Dragon
Operation, on the headquarters of the Indonesian Democratic Party
(PDI) at Jl. Diponegoro 58, Central Jakarta. The incident left
five people dead, 149 injured and 23 missing. In the riot in the
aftermath of the attack, 56 building were burned down and 197
cars were torched. Total material losses were estimated at over
Rp 100 billion.

The attack was typical of what an aging and worried
authoritarian regime would do against any force that dared to
defy it. Back in 1996, the government considered the Megawati
camp that challenged the government-backed Soerjadi faction as
dangerous. A three-week freedom forum, with anyone welcomed to
make a speech at the party's headquarters, reportedly angered
president Soeharto to the extent that he ordered it to be stopped
immediately.

Thus ABRI chief Gen. Feisal Tanjung and other top military
brass, including then Jakarta Military commander Maj. Gen.
Sutiyoso, organized a task force comprising hired thugs, police
and soldiers, all disguised as Soerjadi supporters who stormed
the headquarters that was being defended by Megawati supporters.

Later the government used an old but useful tactic to find
someone on whom to blame the incident: so-called communists.
Therefore the small, leftist and newly established Democratic
People's Party (PRD) was held responsible and its leaders were
purged and arrested. They were accused of treason, and were
eventually tried and put behind bars for years.

After six years, even though Soeharto has been dethroned, many
of his accomplices are still in power. This is the very reason
why the legal process to bring the guilty party to justice has
not been completed, since they have managed to slow down the
process. Sutiyoso, the incumbent Jakarta governor, has been
implicated in the attack.

Apparently six years is not sufficient time to heal the wounds
inflicted by the incident. Not only for the more than 100 PDI
supporters and PRD leaders who were victimized and jailed, or for
the families who lost their loved ones either through death or
disappearance, but for the millions of Indonesians who want to
see justice done.

They understandably felt betrayed when President Megawati
Soekarnoputri endorsed the reelection of Sutiyoso as governor.
Obviously, seeing Sutiyoso still in power would remind them of
the pain of their old wounds, the smell of the burned PDI
headquarters and the decay of our reform movement.

It would be a betrayal of our conscience if we let the legal
process vanish into thin air.