Vaudine England, Jogyakarta – Hundreds of people are signing up for membership of a new anti-communist front at the head office of the Golkar political party, organisers claim.
They say more than 1,600 people from different backgrounds are uniting in Jogyakarta, Central Java, to counter the "renewed threat" in a country where the once widely popular Indonesian Communist Party was banned and its members murdered by army-backed mobs in 1966.
"Our mission is to fight communism, Marxism and Leninism," said Dandung Pardiman, commander of Gepako – the Gerakan Pasukan Anti Komunis, or Anti-Communist Movement, and secretary of Jogyakarta's Golkar office. He alleges the main source of communism is the small but legal People's Democratic Party (PRD).
Mr Pardiman's little-known initiative against alleged communists comes at a time when leading politicians in the capital, Jakarta, are readying their respective bases ahead of next week's likely second censure of President Abdurrahman Wahid.
Mr Wahid threatens to bring thousands of "jihad" fighters to his support against the impeachment efforts of parliament. Mr Pardiman claims credit for establishing Gepako himself and says he covers all the costs. Golkar chairman Akbar Tandjung – the speaker of the House of Representatives, which could censure Mr Wahid – approves, he said. "Pak [Mr] Akbar likes it very, very much," he said.
Gepako is part of a larger grouping, called the Anti-Communist Forum, which Mr Pardiman says includes members of other political parties – which are all part of a Muslim bloc now leading the charge against Mr Wahid in Parliament.
Many in Gepako are also involved in martial arts groups. Mr Pardiman says he is ready to fight but says his main job is education and propaganda. He holds discussion groups every Friday, where members study anti-communist works.
Classes are also held in boxing, he says. New members do not need to pay to join the movement. They get a special identity card and long-sleeved black T-shirt to foster fellow feeling.
Golkar was the election-winning vehicle created by former president Suharto after he took power from former president Sukarno in the wake of an alleged communist coup in 1965.
Doubts have since been cast on who sparked the coup attempt, but it was the excuse for the mob murder of at least 500,000 people, particularly in Java and Bali. Willing tools in the killing spree were members of Muslim organisations who regard communism as atheist and, therefore, blasphemous.
"Yes, there is potential for the same conflict again, as in the 1960s," said Mr Pardiman. "And now things are more crowded, more cruel. If we have to, Gepako can fight again. We are ready to fight, ready to think, ready to discuss. Our philosophy is that everyone must be of the Big Family of Indonesia." Gepako has yet to become a threat on the political stage, but visitors to Jogyakarta now see banners across the main roads that read: "Down with the antics of communists" and proclaim communists are everywhere.
Pro-Wahid demonstrations in East Java in recent months included violent attacks on Golkar party offices and calls for the party to be banned.
In response, Golkar blamed the attacks on communists and called for PRD to be banned. Some members of Wahid's Nahdlatul Ulama mass Muslim organisation, and the PRD, "do the same work", said Mr Pardiman, himself an NU member.