Indonesia Must Face Nation's Gruesome Past

by Andreas Harsono

"Gus Dur asked me about the best person to be the new Attorney General," the commissioner observed, referring to Abdurrahman Wahid -- affectionately known as Gus Dur -- the influential Muslim scholar then chairing the 30-million strong Nahdlatul Ulama organization.

"I mentioned the name of Marzuki Darusman," said the commissioner.

His argument was that Darusman is not only a dedicated and clean politician, a law graduate who knows legal problems, the chairman of the respected National Commission on Human Rights, an elite member of the Golkar ruling party, but that Darusman is also an ambitious person.

Darusman openly says that he would like to be a future president himself. And Darusman does not hesitate to calculate taking bold decisions -- such as arresting dozens of corrupt officials or even jailing Suharto-- to do the right things, to create a kind of a shock therapy in this corrupt society, and at the same time, to boost his own popularity.

"It is a good stepping stone for Marzuki," quipped the commissioner.

That evening's speculative gossip may re-emerge if changes do not happen swiftly in Jakarta after last week's parliamentary election, when Gus Dur was elected Indonesia's fourth president, and this week's appointment of a 36-member Cabinet, when he named Darusman the nation's new Attorney General.

Did Gus Dur, the nearly blind president, himself an ardent human rights campaigner, buy the argument made that night? What did Gus Dur have in mind when appointing Darusman to sit in this most problematic position? What kind of compromise? Does Gus Dur want to reopen the legal case of the 78-year-old Suharto -- who has been accused of siphoning billions of dollars of public funds -- and even to bring the old man and his extremely rich, and logically influential, children to the bar of justice? Is it be possible that Gus Dur, in appointing others to crucial cabinet positions, is actually trying to bring about real reform in Indonesia?

"There is nuance of reconciliation evident here, the wish to be non-exclusive overriding other considerations," said political scientist Kusnanto Anggoro of the Center for Strategic and International Studies.

The politically diverse cabinet is "the maximal result of the compromise," said Emil Salim, a respected economist who served in the Suharto cabinet.

Both Anggoro and Salim were apparently referring to a number of cabinet members, including Darusman, who are considered to be good people, and honest, but not really that professional.

An active lieutenant general was made mining minister. A relatively unknown economist was made finance minister. A youth leader was made a population minister. Two Muslim figures that helped Gus Dur win the executive seat over Megawati were awarded with other key portfolios.

Gus Dur also tried to accommodate people from Indonesia's troubled and rebellious provinces, including Aceh in northern Sumatra and Irian Jaya in eastern Indonesia. He put an Acehnese and a Melanesian in the cabinet.

But others hail the cabinet. Mahrus Irsyam of the University of Indonesia told the Jakarta Post that Juwono Sudarsono is the "ideal man" as the nation's first civilian Minister of Defense. Other professional positioning include economist Kwik Kian Gie (Coordinating Minister on Economics, Finance and Industry), Suryadi Sudirja (home affairs), Laksamana Sukardi (foreign investment), Bomer Pasaribu (labor) and Sarwono Kusumaatmadja (marine exploration).

Gus Dur himself admitted that the line up was "the best of the compromise," saying that Megawati as well as some other opposition figures and military commander General Wiranto were involved in making up and "guaranteeing" their respective proxies in the line-up.

The word "reformasi" in Indonesia actually means "democratization." Its short-term widely-accepted goals include putting the military back in the barracks by abolishing the territorial- cum- political function, developing an undistorted market-oriented economy, amending the executive-heavy 1945 Constitution, revitalizing Indonesia's judiciary, empowering legislators and putting Suharto on trial.

Last but not least, the democratization process must also find a very quick answer to the growing tension between Jakarta and its troubled outer provinces. The answers so far advanced range from setting up a federal state in this world's largest archipelagic country to giving more autonomy to places like Aceh or Irian Jaya. East Timor is already gone from the scene.

How can the question of federalism get a fair asessment when politicians whose interest and constituents are based on the main island of Java still dominate the cabinet? It may get a boost from the parliament whose members better represent Indonesia's more than 300 ethnic groups, some respond.

Java is the most populated island in Indonesia and around 50 percent of Indonesia's 220 million populations live on it. The capital, Jakarta, is the country's largest city, is also located on the island, as are the country's second, fourth and fifth largest cities.

Darusman himself, when asked by journalists about reopening the Suharto case, admitted that injustice is still a problem in Indonesia.

"We will correct and find an optimal solution," Darusman said.

Perhaps it will help Gus Dur and his cabinet to study an observation made by George Orwell in his novel "1984," to the effect that people who control the present control the past. But those who control the past are those who control the future.

Indonesia is going to be able to control its future if it can find a good solution to the problem of justice for the gruesome atrocities of the Suharto regime.