Shaman confirm Soeharto link
<p>Shaman confirm Soeharto link</p><p> JAKARTA (JP): In O.G. Roeder's The Smiling General, the author
wrote that Soeharto once obeyed his trusted shaman in spending
the night of Sept. 30, 1965, "worshiping God at a place where the
waters meet".</p><p>As everybody knows, that night has become one of the grim
nightmares in the country's black history. At least seven Army
senior generals were brutally killed by a group, later identified
as members of the then banned Indonesian Communist Party (PKI).</p><p>But Roeder's account is not just another version of where
Soeharto was on that fateful night 34 years ago.</p><p>It is also about the influential role of shamans.</p><p>Persistent claims of an association between shamans and
Soeharto, who was elected as the country's president several
months after the bloody night, were circulated widely during his
32-year-rule, which ended in May last year.</p><p>Since his resignation, many tabloids have run articles on
Soeharto's alleged connection with supernaturalists.</p><p>The link became much clearer last month when five shamans, led
by 45-year-old Mas Haryo Panuntun, attended Pertamina hospital in
South Jakarta on the fifth day of Soeharto's 10-day treatment for
a mild stroke.</p><p>Attired in caftans, the five attracted the media's attention
at the hospital. Unlike the many media-shy guests of Soeharto,
the shamans were unfazed by the media blitz and TV camera lights.</p><p>At his home in Pekayon, East Jakarta, Haryo, whose real name
is Herry Sukamto, told the Jakarta Post on Tuesday about the
hospital visit: "I poured water obtained from the Istiqlal Grand
Mosque (in Central Jakarta) in a room next to Soeharto's."</p><p>Together with four other shamans, his wife Agatri Pawenang,
assistant Muhammad Ridwan, Nurhayanie and Putu Ariasa, they then
sang Dandhanggula, an ancient Javanese song "to pray for an
ailing person".</p><p>The shamans's role in helping cure Soeharto, who was rushed to
the hospital in the afternoon of July 20 and left the VVIP room
10 days later, remains unclear.</p><p>Haryo quoted Siti Hardiyanti "Tutut" Rukmana, Soeharto's
eldest daughter, as saying the former president had been ill for
days before he was taken to hospital.</p><p>"Several days before her father was admitted to the hospital,
Mbak Tutut complained to me that her father's illness was
worsening, and she then asked me to help cure her father by
praying."</p><p>During the July 24 visit, Haryo and the other shamans were not
allowed to meet the VVIP patient directly.</p><p>Haryo said he saw Soeharto through a glass wall of the ward
where he was receiving treatment. He said the shamans could
easily have performed their mystical efforts in the same room as
Soeharto, with no significant objections from the patient's
guards.</p><p>"In fact, we could cure him from our homes using what we call
long distance therapy, which we already had done. But we favored
approaching closer to Soeharto's physical presence in a bid to
add power to the medicinal treatment."</p><p>Haryo said he had known Tutut since their first meeting in
Surakarta, Central Java, in the early 1980s at the burial of
Tutut's grandmother.</p><p>Haryo claimed that there was no payment for the shamans
service from either Mbak Tutut or other relatives.</p><p>"We did it mainly to pay our respects to the former country's
strongman," he said.</p><p>However, Haryo, who claimed to specialize in curing the deaf
and people with eye problems, quickly added:</p><p>"We'll accept a payment if in the future Mbak Tutut feels our
efforts are useful for her father's recovery." (asa)</p>
wrote that Soeharto once obeyed his trusted shaman in spending
the night of Sept. 30, 1965, "worshiping God at a place where the
waters meet".</p><p>As everybody knows, that night has become one of the grim
nightmares in the country's black history. At least seven Army
senior generals were brutally killed by a group, later identified
as members of the then banned Indonesian Communist Party (PKI).</p><p>But Roeder's account is not just another version of where
Soeharto was on that fateful night 34 years ago.</p><p>It is also about the influential role of shamans.</p><p>Persistent claims of an association between shamans and
Soeharto, who was elected as the country's president several
months after the bloody night, were circulated widely during his
32-year-rule, which ended in May last year.</p><p>Since his resignation, many tabloids have run articles on
Soeharto's alleged connection with supernaturalists.</p><p>The link became much clearer last month when five shamans, led
by 45-year-old Mas Haryo Panuntun, attended Pertamina hospital in
South Jakarta on the fifth day of Soeharto's 10-day treatment for
a mild stroke.</p><p>Attired in caftans, the five attracted the media's attention
at the hospital. Unlike the many media-shy guests of Soeharto,
the shamans were unfazed by the media blitz and TV camera lights.</p><p>At his home in Pekayon, East Jakarta, Haryo, whose real name
is Herry Sukamto, told the Jakarta Post on Tuesday about the
hospital visit: "I poured water obtained from the Istiqlal Grand
Mosque (in Central Jakarta) in a room next to Soeharto's."</p><p>Together with four other shamans, his wife Agatri Pawenang,
assistant Muhammad Ridwan, Nurhayanie and Putu Ariasa, they then
sang Dandhanggula, an ancient Javanese song "to pray for an
ailing person".</p><p>The shamans's role in helping cure Soeharto, who was rushed to
the hospital in the afternoon of July 20 and left the VVIP room
10 days later, remains unclear.</p><p>Haryo quoted Siti Hardiyanti "Tutut" Rukmana, Soeharto's
eldest daughter, as saying the former president had been ill for
days before he was taken to hospital.</p><p>"Several days before her father was admitted to the hospital,
Mbak Tutut complained to me that her father's illness was
worsening, and she then asked me to help cure her father by
praying."</p><p>During the July 24 visit, Haryo and the other shamans were not
allowed to meet the VVIP patient directly.</p><p>Haryo said he saw Soeharto through a glass wall of the ward
where he was receiving treatment. He said the shamans could
easily have performed their mystical efforts in the same room as
Soeharto, with no significant objections from the patient's
guards.</p><p>"In fact, we could cure him from our homes using what we call
long distance therapy, which we already had done. But we favored
approaching closer to Soeharto's physical presence in a bid to
add power to the medicinal treatment."</p><p>Haryo said he had known Tutut since their first meeting in
Surakarta, Central Java, in the early 1980s at the burial of
Tutut's grandmother.</p><p>Haryo claimed that there was no payment for the shamans
service from either Mbak Tutut or other relatives.</p><p>"We did it mainly to pay our respects to the former country's
strongman," he said.</p><p>However, Haryo, who claimed to specialize in curing the deaf
and people with eye problems, quickly added:</p><p>"We'll accept a payment if in the future Mbak Tutut feels our
efforts are useful for her father's recovery." (asa)</p>