RI, Holland to set up joint heritage committee
Ida Indawati Khouw, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta
The governments of Indonesia and the Netherlands have agreed to set up a joint heritage committee to preserve Indonesia's Dutch related heritage, the visiting Dutch State Secretary for Education, Culture and Science, Frederick van der Ploeg, said.
The agreement was reached after a meeting with Minister of Culture and Tourism I Gede Ardhika on Thursday. The committee is expected to be set up by the middle of next year.
"The committee will be tasked with identifying a number of feasible joint projects, which can be carried out within a quick time frame, in the fields of museums, archeology, monuments and archives," he told a press conference at Kedai Tempo in East Jakarta, before completing his week-long official visit.
He said that conserving heritage in Indonesia was very important for a number of reasons. "The archives of the VOC (Verenigde Oost Indische Compagnie, the Dutch East India Company -- the ruler of the Dutch East Indies until 1799) here, for example, also tell us a lot of things about the history of other countries, such as Sri Lanka, Japan and the rest of Asia."
He said that so far there had been some ad hoc preservation projects that involved the provision of training courses by experts from the Royal Institute of the Tropics for museum staff as well as for archivists on special methods of conserving the archives.
Van der Ploeg said that his visit to Indonesia was important because for the last two years, following the approval of the Dutch parliament, Indonesia had been considered as the priority country for cultural exchanges.
Another reason for his visit was related to the planned major commemoration of the VOC's 400th anniversary in the Netherlands next year.
"I have encouraged people involved in the commemoration project to also pay particular attention to the not so pleasant aspect of the VOC. One should not just see it as something glorious, (that is) the contribution to the golden age of the Netherlands but also to humanitarian, economic and other aspects.
"Many things should be documented such as what happened in Indonesia and other parts of Asia (during the VOC era), which has possibly cast something of a shadow over Dutch history," he said.
Van der Ploeg added: "We should make the new generations realize that many of the beautiful canal houses of Amsterdam were built from the wealth of this part of the world. I learned a lot about that by talking to Indonesian experts and Cabinet ministers so as to gain a bit more of an understanding about the sensitive aspects of this issue."