Why was Kunio barred?

Once again a foreign scholar has been barred from entering Indonesia. Yoshihara Kunio, a historian who teaches at Kyoto University's Southeast Asian Studies Center but who is better known as the author of The Rise of Ersatz Capitalism in Southeast Asia, was denied entry at Jakarta's Soekarno-Hatta International Airport on Sunday for reasons that have thus far remained unclarified.

An executive of the Jakarta office of Kyoto University told this newspaper on Tuesday that the Japanese scholar, while on a tour of the region, intended to meet friends in Indonesia and was scheduled to arrive on Sunday. Apparently, Kunio did arrive here as scheduled, but was told by airport immigration officials he could not enter the country. No specific reasons were given.

Had it been a year earlier, though, one could have easily understood the government's aversion to allowing Kunio into the country. His aforementioned book on ersatz (false) capitalism angered president Soeharto's New Order government almost as soon as it came out in 1988. A translated version of the book was banned and Kunio was barred from entering Indonesia.

All of which was understandable enough at the time. After all, Ersatz Capitalism dealt with the phenomenal rise of big businesses in Southeast Asia (and many other developing countries) -- not on the strength of their inherent skills or resources, but through collaboration with the ruling elites. Since this was one of the most sensitive of issues at that time, the Attorney General's Office ruled that the book undermined president Soeharto's credibility and had to be banned.

Of course, since then, and especially after the fall of Soeharto in May last year, there are no longer any secrets about how "cronies" of the old regime acquired their business privileges and their wealth. The issue is freely reported in newspapers and discussed in public on an almost daily basis. The current government under President B.J. Habibie has publicly promised to earnestly look into the alleged wrongdoings committed by his fallen predecessor, particularly where corrupt, collusive or nepotistic practices are suspected.

These facts alone would make it hard to understand the government's reasoning in denying Kunio entry. It must, however, be added that Kunio's book on ersatz capitalism was an academic work and should be acknowledged as such. The Soeharto regime's angry reaction to the work in fact constituted an indirect acknowledgement of the soundness of Kunio's arguments.

Furthermore, the government's refusal to grant Kunio entry is odd, to say the least, considering that scholars and observers who have long been known to be critical of Soeharto's New Order government, such as American political observers Daniel Lev and Benedict Anderson, have not only been allowed into the country, but to attend public seminars, give lectures and deliver scientific papers.

All this considered, one is left to wonder what exactly the reason was behind the government's denying Prof. Kunio entry into the country. It could of course be a simple instance of bureaucratic deficiency. In that case, the government, and the immigration department in particular, would be well advised to improve its management and update its files. It is believed that, at present, immigration files still contain some 500 names of people who are barred from entering Indonesia. But while denying entry to people whose presence would pose a real danger to either the country or to the public is certainly legitimate, barring the wrong people could not only harm Indonesia's image as an emerging democracy, but actually harm the public's interest by denying people their right to be informed and educated.

The other possibility -- that the government still regards anyone who is (or was) critical as dangerous to the country -- is even less palatable since it only helps to show that all the official assurances about reform are just so much poppycock. Fortunately, this is likely to be the lesser possibility. Still, the authorities would do well to educate the entire bureaucracy under their control to make real and immediate adjustments to the demands of this new era of reform.