Supersemar was meant to lead the country to democracy

Supersemar was meant to lead the country to democracy

By Benget Simbolon

JAKARTA (JP): "It's amazing to see that within three years we managed to stabilize our economy. Look at Russia, which is still in a mess after the 1989 revolution," said Frans Seda, who held several ministerial positions both in Old and New Order governments in an interview with The Jakarta Post.

This success, he said, was due to the then government's practice of transparency and meaningful communication with the various groups, even with students.

Supersemar was a way to secure the basic idea of New Order: Back to democracy. People were interested in the New Order because of its commitment to restoring democracy by opposing President Sukarno with his guided democracy, which was actually not democracy in the real sense.

The process of creating the New Order was started in 1960, when the Indonesian Armed Forces (ABRI) was trying to establish a political infrastructure.

But according to Seda, the reality is that the New Order succeeded in exterminating the Communist Party (PKI), but thirty years on has yet to develop democracy.

The following are excerpts from the interview with Frans Seda on the occasion of the commemoration of the March 11, 1966, Executive Order which was given by President Sukarno to General Soeharto to restore order in the aftermath of the attempted communist coup of Sept. 30, 1965.

On the background of the New Order: Actually, the basic idea behind the New Order was democracy. We were interested in and supported the New Order because of its strong commitment to restoring democracy by opposing the leadership of President Sukarno.

The September 1965 coup by the Indonesian Communist Party (PKI) was only the momentum used by the pro-democracy exponents.

Foreign countries were surprised to see how the charismatic and very influential Sukarno could have been overthrown by the Indonesian people. Even President Sukarno himself was surprised by his fall.

There was not only the matter of fighting the communists. No. It was also the reflection of the people's wish to rid itself of Sukarno's system of guided democracy.

At that time, with the support of the Indonesian Armed Forces (ABRI), the people established the Democracy League. But then President Sukarno asked its founder to disband the organization. As ABRI did not want to get involved in an open conflict with Sukarno, it just allowed the organization to be dissolved.

On the preparation of New Order supporters: The process of creating a New Order was actually started in 1960 by ABRI. At that time, ABRI established a political infrastructure. To deal with political matters, it set up what was then called Koti (highest operation command) whose members included all ministers. To deal with economic matters it set up what was called Kotoe (highest economy command). To drum up support from the general public, it set up what was called BKS (cooperation board).

The three organizations managed to keep PKI's movements in check. Within the government, it was controlled by Koti and Kotoe and within the general public it was controlled by BKS.

Helped by the political infrastructure, ABRI was ready to face the PKI when the latter tried to gain control of Indonesian politics.

To consolidate its position, ABRI organized a meeting in East Java, where the late General Achmad Yani told officers that ABRI was anti-communist.

On PKI's counter movement: The ABRI's movement prompted the PKI to propose to President Sukarno that Indonesia, which had already four branches of the Armed Forces--Army, Navy, Air Force and Police--form a fifth force (peasants and workers). But President Sukarno refused to countenance such a notion.

On why ABRI had support: We supported ABRI because we saw that ABRI has always been independent in terms of politics. There are two sides to ABRI. One ABRI that is independent in politics and another that is a tool of the state.

Now, as ABRI serves as the state tool and is independent politically, we do see a double function of the Indonesian Armed Forces. It leaves political matters to the Functional Group (Golkar) and it is no longer independent in politics. It has became a government tool rather than a state tool. It is no longer able to distance itself from the government the way it did in Sukarno's day.

On the main actors creating the New Order: The political actors who came forward after the September 1965 coup seemed to be the heroes. But actually they were nothing of the sort. They only followed a political design that had been stenciled out earlier, as I have mentioned before. The New Order was based on an existing political blueprint and the bravery of the Indonesian Armed Forces.

But to mention one man. I think Ali Moertopo was one of the most outstanding figures in the birth of the New Order. He effectively used Koti, Kotoe and BKS to counter every move of the PKI.

When ABRI got involved in the conflict with Sukarno, Ali Moertopo came up with an idea to launch Opsus (special operation). As he needed financial back-up for such an operation, I installed him as a plantation representative in Bangkok, Thailand.

On the September attempted coup: In 1964, PKI was known to make a five year plan to fight against the government. It was reportedly Adam Malik who first got hold of this information. This led to his move from being minister of trade to being minister of economic democracy.

In 1965, the signs pointing toward the imminent coup were beginning to be detected, among other things in Soebandrio's speech: "Our motherland is already in an advanced stage of pregnancy. This year is a decisive year. Friends could become enemies and enemies could become friends."

On Sept. 27, 1965, Soebandrio as the then prime minister made a visit to Sumatra. He brought with him 15 ministers, including me (as minister for plantations).

First we visited Lampung, then Bengkulu and Padang, West Sumatra. In every province, he made a speech in front of mass gatherings arranged by the Communist Party and then held a meeting with regional government officials.

On Sept. 30, we were in Medan. He canceled a general public meeting. We were scheduled to proceed to Aceh on Oct. 1 but a news story from Jakarta abruptly changed our itinerary. The news story told of an attempt to kill General A.H. Nasution in Jakarta on Sept. 30 but failed.

At that time, Soebandrio came to tell us: "ABRI and PKI have long been quarreling. Before we left, I had already told President Sukarno about this. So let's just wait and see who comes up as the winner."

So Soebandrio's journey to Medan was actually set to anticipate the success of the coup in Jakarta. If the Jakarta coup had been successful, the second coup would have been in Medan, which was at that time economically a very important city outside Java.

On the birth of Supersemar: After the Communist coup, we were trying to separate the issue of Bung Karno from the issue of PKI. Many people still supported President Sukarno.

On Nov. 9, political parties held a general meeting and invited Bung Karno to make his first speech after the coup. But the president refused to attend. We reckoned that Sukarno was still needed by the people. General Soeharto himself once recounted one of his conversations with Sukarno to me in which he says he said: "I'll return this baton to you if you condemn the Communist Party." But he reportedly refused.

The political parties' meeting came up with 22 resolutions, including a demand for the dissolution of the incumbent cabinet.

The New Order at that time was on the rise. But things turned out differently in December 1966. Our economy saw the worst condition. The government had to make a drastic currency reform, slashing the currency's nominal value by a thousand, from Rp 1,000 to Rp 1.

Sukarno's supporters set up Barisan Sukarno (Sukarno's Guard) which was immediately countered by an anti-Sukarno movement. The two opposing groups were often engaged in conflict. Many political demonstrations turned into riots. These developments obviously threatened the idea of New Order. We thought if we did not take immediate steps to secure the New Order process, the idea might die away.

I suspected that those conflicts were engineered by Sukarno's opponents to create a situation that would play into their hands.

On March 10, a group of anti-Sukarnoites that was supported by ABRI intimidated a cabinet meeting. President Sukarno left the meeting and fled Jakarta aboard a helicopter to his palace in Bogor.

General Soeharto and me were absent from the meeting as we had previously been phoned by Ali Moertopo and told not to attend.

Acknowledging the worsening situation, Sukarno then acceded to Soeharto's demand that Sukarno give him the authority to restore order and stability and to maintain security. The authority was stipulated in a letter, which is known as Supersemar or the Letter of March 11.

Vested with this authority, General Soeharto acted immediately to dissolve the Indonesian Communist Party.

But for me, Supersemar was not only aimed at overthrowing the Communist Party. It was also aimed at establishing a new structure -- the New Order -- which I thought was against Sukarno's will.

Here I saw the role of ABRI. General Soeharto just followed the tradition of ABRI: politically self reliant.

On who drafted the Supersemar: There were many individuals involved in the political process that led to the creation of Supersemar. That was a historical process. Before the signing of Supersemar by Sukarno, tough negotiations were proceeding between Leimena, Soebandrio and Chaerul Saleh. I noticed that Leimena helped a lot in formulating the Supersemar.

But I thought there would have been a written concept prepared before the negotiations and I suspect that Ali Moertopo was the person who made the concept. He was one of the most outstanding figures in designing the Supersemar. If there were any people who said that the credit should go to General M. Jusuf and the other two generals because it was them who came to Bogor to negotiate directly with Sukarno, I would say that they were only used in a scenario set by others.

Ali Moertopo should be credited for the Supersemar. For me he was an outstanding person. That's why I once protested to President Soeharto who belittled Ali's role in one of his books. I said: "Look, this man is the architect of the New Order. He did many good things to help the creation of the New Order long before the signing of the Supersemar. This man helped you in your efforts to gain the trust of the people."

On the aftermath of Supersemar: The first program of New Order was economy as the New Order could gain a political legitimacy only if it came up with economic policies. It was General Soeharto who made a decision on this. He employed two personal assistants (Aspri): Ali Moertopo who dealt with political matters and Widjojo Nitisastro who dealt with economic matters.

Widjojo later expanded his influence in economy. Economic programs during the first decade of New Order were strongly marked by his views and those of other economists closest to him. Later their views were crystallized in a group called Berkeley Group as its members were mostly graduates from Berkeley University. Among the members were Prof. Mohammad Sadli, Ali Wardhana, Subroto who all later became ministers dealing with economic matters.

Soeharto himself gained an increasingly stronger position on the political stage. After Supersemar he changed the cabinet. And Sukarno's political influence soon faded away.

There were no government regulations which were not subject to the approval of the House of Representatives.

So the Supersemar actually was a way to secure the basic idea of the New Order: back to democracy. But the reality is that the New Order had succeeded in exterminating the Communist Party but has yet to develop democracy.