M. Taufiqurrahman, Jakarta – Former political prisoners linked to the Indonesian Communist Party (PKI), and human rights activists are unhappy about the government's seeming unwillingness to establish the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (KKR).
They said Saturday the commission was their last hope to have their reputations rehabilitated and their rights recognized.
"We hope that our civil rights could be restored by this commission. And through this commission, we want the perpetrators of the crimes against us tried in court. But we are pessimistic that such a commission will be set up before the President's term ends (in 2009)," former political prisoner Robby Sumolang told The Jakarta Post.
Robby, 60, was incarcerated in the Buru island jail for 14 years without a proper trial for his alleged involvement in the failed Sept. 30, 1965, coup blamed on the PKI.
A member of the Indonesian Youth and Students Association (IPPI), then the largest of such organizations in the country, he was arrested by military police officers soon after the coup attempt.
The former teacher was not released from jail until December 1979. On attaining his freedom, he learned all of his property had been seized by the New Order government of president Soeharto.
"Although all of my belongings were confiscated by the government, I don't want the KKR, if established, to give me compensation. Rehabilitating my name will be enough. I know that the government doesn't have enough money to pay us," he said.
Financial compensation, however, is an issue for Payung Salenda, 81, another former political prisoner who was also arrested after the PKI coup.
"The planned commission must have a mechanism to give financial compensation. I was a civil servant before I was arrested and I had paid a premium for my pension, but I never received a penny of it," Payung told the Post.
Payung was a civil servant at the office of deputy prime minister J. Leimena, when he was arrested and sent to jail in late 1965. His offense – visiting Moscow and Kiev in 1957 to attend an international youth congress.
The demands by the victims, however, will unlikely be met in the near future. President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono has said little about setting up the truth commission despite the passing in 2004 of the law mandating the body.
State Secretary Yusril Ihza Mahendra recently said the President was having problems appointing members of the planned commission because he did not have enough information about the candidates.
Yusril said Yudhoyono would consult the selection team for the commission to find out more about the candidates sometime before the Idul Fitri holidays.
The selection team has screened and submitted 42 candidates for the commission to the President, who is supposed to pick 21 names, which will be presented to the House of Representatives for final approval.
Under the law, the commission is tasked with probing past human rights abuses that took place from 1945-2000. Many high-level government officials and security chiefs from the New Order era were implicated in these violations.
The Institute for Policy Research and Advocacy (Elsam) criticized Yusril's statement, saying it was a smokescreen for the government's unwillingness to set up the commission.
"The (creation of the) KKR does not require candidates to know or be known by the President. So such a reason is an embellishment," Elsam executive director Agung Putri Astrid Artika said in a statement.