Rest in peace?
Nearly 32 years ago, precisely on Oct. 1, 1965, a five-year old girl captured the nation's heart with the ultimate sacrifice she made for her father. Ade Irma Suryani, the youngest daughter of Gen. Abdul Haris Nasution, died of bullet wounds which she received when a group of soldiers visited her house on that fateful morning in an attempt to kidnap her father. Nasution survived the ordeal, but his daughter did not. The nation then wept for her as much as it did for the seven Army officers who were butchered by the plotters of the Sept. 30 Movement.
The entire affair represented a dark page, a tragedy, in the nation's history, and Ade Irma, as much as the seven murdered Army officers, was a victim of that sad incident.
Last week, when the ailing retired general Nasution prayed and wept before Ade Irma's grave at Blok P Cemetery in South Jakarta, he evoked memories of that day in 1965 when news of her death was announced. Nasution had gone to the tomb after the South Jakarta mayoralty announced its plans to remove her grave. The cemetery has been acquired as the site for the mayoralty's future office complex.
Nasution did not say if he had agreed to the planned removal. It was his wife, Johana Sunarti, who broke their silence on Thursday by criticizing the plan as "insensitive to history". Johana Sunarti rejected the administration's offer to relocate the grave to the hero's cemetery, just as her husband did when such an offer was made nearly 32 years ago. She insists that Ade Irma should be buried close to the people.
The plan to remove Ade Irma's grave has evoked a public outcry, though not to the same extent as her death did 32 years ago. The day after Nasution visited the tomb, a number of city councilors went to the grave to pay homage to Ade Irma. Criticisms against the administration also flowed in. The public response is a measure of its displeasure at the insensitivity, as well as the arrogance, of the administration in handling the affair.
Administration officials and the Nasution family are scheduled to meet this week to try to break the impasse. Given that most other graves in Blok P cemetery have been, or are being removed, the South Jakarta mayoralty is expected to have its way eventually. We hope there will be a compromise that satisfies both parties, one that takes into account Nasution's stature, and the special place Ade Irma has in most people's hearts.
The entire affair nevertheless has created uncertainty about how secure a cemetery is, if even important national figures, such as Ade Irma, are not spared from bureaucratic decisions to convert public cemeteries to other uses.
Johana Sunarti recalled she had been given assurances by the administration and the city council 32 years ago that the Blok P cemetery was permanent. City officials are now insisting that the administration has the right to change the spatial planning of the city, including the use of all state land such as that of public cemeteries, as it sees fit. In the case of Blok P, the administration has decided that it needs the land to build the new South Jakarta mayoralty office complex.
Putting aside the argument as to whether or not the mayoralty needs a new office, the decision to convert the cemetery into an office complex could hardly be comforting for anyone intending to be buried in one of the city's public cemeteries. It seems that even in death we cannot avoid the hands of bureaucracy.