The final words of defiance
Lie Hua, Contributor, Jakarta
-------------------------------- Revolusi Belum Selesai -- Kumpulan Pidato Presiden Soekarno 30 September 1965 - Pelengkap Nawaksara (The Revolution is Not Over Yet Collected Speeches of President Soekarno's addresses -- September 30, 1965 - Supplement to Nawaksara) Edited by Budi Setiyono-Bonnie Triyana Foreword by Dr. Aswi Warman Adam Messias, Jakarta, July 2003 2 vols (xxxiv+ 446 pp & xxxiv+ 456 pp)
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Sept. 30, 1965, is a black day in the history of modern Indonesia. The assassination of seven generals in the wee hours of Oct. 1 sparked a ghastly orgy of bloodletting and vigilantism in the ensuing months.
The murders were blamed on the Indonesian Communist Party (PKI), and hundreds of thousands of Indonesians (the actual number has never been documented) accused of being PKI sympathizers were slain or forced into exile.
The political consequences were also enormous. The country's founding president, Sukarno, ailing with kidney disease and other ailments, gradually lost his grip on power as Soeharto, one of the top Army leaders who, miraculously, was excluded from the Sept. 30 hit-list, installed his New Order regime.
The 61 speeches collected in these two volumes, gleaned from a total of 103 unpublished addresses delivered between Sept. 30, 1965, to Jan. 10, 1967, provide a wealth of information about the country's situation and the defiance of Sukarno in those fateful days.
It's for these very reasons that they could not have been published during the autocratic New Order regime, which collapsed with Soeharto's resignation in May 1998.
Sukarno (the book uses the old spelling of his name) was renowned as an ardent, dynamic orator. An eloquent, intelligent, well-read man, he could speak extemporaneously for hours, captivating the masses and fueling their revolutionary spirit.
The speeches take the reader back to that era, and also show the seething anger of this proud man.
The collection opens with Soekarno's address at a national engineering conference on Sept. 30, 1965, in which he urged the audience to continue building Indonesia's own brand of socialism.
There is an interruption of several days before the Oct. 3 radio address to the nation concerning the attempted coup. In this address, he reaffirmed his position as Supreme Commander of the Indonesian Armed Forces and denied the allegation that the Air Force was involved in the abortive coup. He also warned members of the Army and the Air Force not to allow themselves to be pitted against each other.
But events were already spiraling out of his control. On Oct. 16, Soeharto, then major-general, was installed as minister/commander-in-chief of the Army. In his address on this occasion, Sukarno refuted rumors that he had lost power and concluded by instructing Soeharto to carry out his duties to the utmost of his abilities.
Despite the inexorable change of leadership -- Soeharto taking charge, Sukarno an increasingly lonely figure at the top -- the latter's fiery speeches, which had stood him in good stead through the War of Independence against the Dutch and standing up to the "Neo-Colonial powers" in the late 1950s and 1960s, continued.
On March 11, 1966, there was a transfer of power of sorts to Soeharto (the document, however, has disappeared from the archives). Yet, it is interesting to note that in his address at the closing of the general session of the Provisional People's Consultative Assembly (MPRS) on July 6, 1966, Sukarno took pains to assert his power, emphasizing that his March 11 executive order to Soeharto was not to be construed as a transfer of authority, as was reported in the foreign media.
He reiterated that it was merely an order to Soeharto to ensure the government could run well.
In many of the speeches, it's not a case of reading between the lines for meaning; Sukarno's resistance to Soeharto is clearly evident. When speaking before the commanders-in-chief of the Army, Air Force, the Navy and the Police, for example, Sukarno said: "MPRS has appointed me the Supreme Leader of the Revolution. Honestly, not you Soebandrio, not you Leimena ...... not you Soeharto, not you Soeharto ..."
It's telling that Soeharto's is the only name repeated twice.
He tried to defend his power on every occasion, speaking like a supreme commander, even as control was wrested from his grasp by a younger, more powerful usurper.
In the last address in this collection, supplementing his accountability report to the MPRS on Jan. 10, 1967, he sounds like someone desperately trying to defend himself.
"If you talk about Truth and Justice, I also demand Truth and Justice. ... Is it fair that I alone must be responsible for the drop in our economy? ... I don't think it is fair to hold only one person responsible for all these matters."
They are the words of a fallen hero, a leader who once commanded respect from his people and gave orders at will who is now seeking pity as his world crumbles around him. That is the real lesson of history.