RI needs to rewrite its history: Anthropologist

YOGYAKARTA (JP): Dutch-born anthropologist Niels Mulder said Indonesia needed to rewrite its history to reconstruct the trail of events which had deliberately been geared to serve the interests of the New Order regime.

Mulder particularly cited the widely lauded historical March 1, 1959, general attack, Serangan Umum, by the rag-tag Indonesian forces which he claimed was orchestrated by Yogyakarta monarch Sri Sultan Hamengkubuwono IX.

The event was one of the historic turning points in the defense of Indonesia's independence.

But in recent years, films and history books have accentuated the role of former president Soeharto as the sole protagonist of the daring raid.

Speaking after the launch of his book, entitled Indonesian Images: The Culture of the Public World, Mulder said on Wednesday that "it was very embarrassing to change the history of a nation just to make someone's name famous."

"Don't be like the Soviet Union, where history is rewritten every five years," he said.

Published by Kanisius, Mulder's newest book is a study of the development of Indonesian society.

It portrays how Indonesians think and learn in facing growing problems and phenomena, including politics, economy, media, law, human rights, public opinion, democracy and social justice.

Mulder identified two authorized institutions in the public sphere which had an important impact on these developments, namely the state (politics) and the economy.

"A state is basically a feudalistic structure and does not accept any command. In the past, we knew that the so-called Kanjeng Gubermen (governor) could not accept order, just like the feudalistic government of Soeharto," he said. (swa/edt)