Joe Collins from the Australia West Papua Association responds to Peter McCawley's item on Peter Cosgrove's views on Indonesia, a piece which also mentioned Ambassador Greg Moriarty:

Our ambassador to Indonesia, Greg Moriarty believes '... a stable, strong and prosperous Indonesia is also vital for Australia's prosperity and security. Indeed as a neighbouring country – Indonesia's continued stability and unity is a core interest for Australia'.

Not many people would disagree that we should try and get on with our neighbours but the question is how much can we ignore human rights abuses that are going on next door?

If we take the government's refusal to release secret 30-year-old documents about the war in East Timor and in particular those documents which relate to the 'fence of legs', a military operation conducted by Indonesian forces in East Timor resulting in the deaths of thousands of East Timorese civilians, what does this say about us as a country?

University of NSW academic Clinton Fernandes has applied to secure the release of the documents relating to Indonesia's treatment of East Timorese people between 1981 and 1982 and believes that the governments documents from that period reveal a 'pattern of concealment' about what was happening in East Timor, about which there had been 'bipartisan consensus'.

Of course the real 'rub point' in our relationship with Indonesia will be West Papua. Yes, Indonesia has made great progress towards democracy since the fall of Suharto but not in West Papua. This month a number of West Papuan political prisoners received between 15 and 18 years jail for simply raising the West Papuan flag, the Morning Star.

Another indicator of the lack of improvement in the human rights situation in West Papua is the increasing number of political prisoners in the territory. At the beginning of January 2013, there were 33 political prisoners in Papuan jails. By December 2013 there were at least 70.

I'm not sure the West Papua people would agree with our Prime Minister when he said on his visit to Indonesia in September last year, 'I admire and respect what you and your government have done to improve the autonomy and the life of the people of West Papua and I am confident that they can have the best possible life and the best possible future as a part of an indissoluble Indonesia, as an integral part of Indonesia'.

Police arrests ten suspects of Papua shooting incident

Antara News - February 3, 2014

Jakarta – The Indonesian Police have arrested ten suspects from the Papua shooting incident that claimed an army personnel from 753 Battalion First Private Sugianto in Mulia, Puncak Jaya District on Friday.

"We have arrested ten persons. The interception was conducted in cooperation with the team," stated Chief of Indonesian Police General Sutarman here, on Monday.

Sutarman made the remark during a technical meeting at the Police Headquarter in Jakarta.

The police, stated Sutarman, are interrogating the suspects who are believed to be the members of Free Papua Movement. The Police also seized a hand gun F 16 type from one of the suspects.

First Private Sugianto had been shot when he was patrolling along with the Police in Pintu Angin area, which was previously the shooting scene of Indonesian Military contra armed group in Papua.

The shooting had killed a member from the armed group; theIndonesia set diplomatic relation with Saint Kitts and Nevis police had also seized an AK-47 rifle.

The XVII Military Region Commander Major General Christian Zebua informed Antara that Sugianto had died in Mulia even as he was heading toward the shooting scene in Pintu Angin.

"First Private Sugianto died when he came to the shooting scene with the Police," Zebua assured. According to Indonesian Military information the body of Sugianto was flown to Jayapura by Susi Air plane on Friday.

Student arrested with ammo in Papua airport

Jakarta Post - February 3, 2014

Nethy Dharma Somba, Jayapura – Officials at Sentani Airport in Jayapura, Papua, arrested a man, identified as KDM, 30, because he was carrying eight 8.4 mm carbine cartridges on Monday.

Sentani Airport Police sub-precinct chief, First Insp. Abraham Soumilena, said that the airport officials found the ammunition in his bag when it was scanned by an x-ray device.

"The man was entering the waiting room to continue his journey to Nabire on a Wings Air flight. He was detained and questioned over the ammo," he said.

KDM, who claims to be a student of Indonesian Christian University (UKI) in Jakarta, arrived at Sentani Airport on 6:05 a.m. local time on Lion Air flight JT 794. He could not provide any personal identification when he was being examined by the police.

Abraham said that KDM had been transferred to Jayapura Police station for further questioning. (put)

Jakarta accused of 'hijacking' MSG mission to West Papua

Red Flag Newspaper - February 3, 2014

Up to 30 activists were arrested during the Melanesian Spearhead Group (MSG) visit to the West Papua provincial capital of Jayapura on 13 January. Supporters of West Papuan independence say the visit was hijacked by Jakarta to thwart the West Papua National Coalition for Liberation (WPNCL) bid to join the MSG.

Police denied the arrests, claiming the protesters were taken into custody for "questioning" because the rally was illegal. The Tabloid Jubi said that 42 West Papuans were detained.

Following a closed meeting at his office, Papua Governor Lukas Enembe called on the Papuan people not to dwell on alleged past human rights violations because Papua is now "more open", emphasising that the MSG visit was primarily to promote bilateral, cultural and economic relations.

West Papua was annexed by Indonesia from the Netherlands in 1969. Since that time, it is estimated that as many as 500,000 Papuans have been killed by Indonesian security forces. Sydney University's West Papua Project reports that the situation is approaching genocide. Papuan activists want self-determination for their people; joining the MSG is seen as a step towards this goal.

The MSG is made up of Fiji, Papua New Guinea, the Solomon Islands, Vanuatu and the Socialist National Liberation Front (FLNKS) - a pro-independence group from French-ruled New Caledonia. The MSG has promoted regional decolonisation, and in recent years Vanuatu has strongly supported West Papuan independence.

Indonesian handouts

For the first time at an MSG leaders' summit in Noumea in June, the WPNCL was invited as an official guest. Indonesia, which has MSG observer status, was also present. The meeting was to decide on the WPNCL's membership application, but a decision was delayed thanks to Indonesian lobbying of Fiji, the grouping's current chair.

The summit ended with an endorsement of the "inalienable rights of the people of West Papua towards self-determination" and efforts to raise concerns about atrocities with Jakarta. It was announced that a foreign ministers' visit to West Papua would take place within six months, ahead of a decision on WPNCL's membership.

Jakarta has since been working hard to woo Melanesian leaders individually. In June, PNG Prime Minister Peter O'Neill and Foreign Minister Rimbink Pato led a delegation to Jakarta to hold business talks instead of attending the MSG summit. The three-day visit concluded with the signing of an extradition treaty and commercial and civil agreements. Rights activists slammed the treaty, saying it would be used to expel thousands of West Papuans who have fled to PNG.

In August, a visit to Jakarta by Solomon Islands Prime Minister Gordon Darcy Lilo resulted in agreements on technical cooperation, trade commitments and people-to-people relations. According to a report by the Solomon Star, senior officials on the delegation received US$25,000 each from Indonesia.

In January, Radio New Zealand International reported that Indonesia donated US$500,000 to the soon to be established Regional Police Academy in Fiji, which will be used to train police from MSG countries.

PNG's Pato said that the MSG recognises the success of "special autonomy" in Papua. Fijian Foreign Affairs Minister Ratu Inoke Kubuabola was quoted by the Jakarta Globe as saying, "We fully respect Indonesia's sovereignty and territorial integrity and we further recognise that West Papua is an integral part of Indonesia."

Vanuatu objects

Vanuatu withdrew from the scheduled foreign ministers' delegation at the last minute and, along with the FLNKS, sent only special envoys. Foreign Minister Edward Natapei said the mission was unlikely to achieve what MSG leaders wanted, which was to meet with West Papuan groups - including leaders of pro-independence movements.

Vanuatu also took exception to a joint statement prepared by the MSG and Indonesia because it failed to mention the purpose of the visit or anything to do with the plight of West Papuans. "Just one day before we were to depart Vanuatu to travel to Indonesia, we got the program of the visit, which neglected, it did not involve a meeting with civil society, it did not involve a meeting with the West Papuan people, the leadership in West Papua, who are concerned about human rights and who could give us more information about the WPNCL that is based in Vanuatu. We realised that in fact it was being hijacked by the government of Indonesia to work on another issue, which was to promote economic ties and development cooperation with the government of Indonesia. We felt that we were going to fail in the mission", Natapei told Radio Australia.

Liputan6.com reported that a group of West Papuan students in Jakarta tried to block a vehicle transporting MSG delegates, calling on the ministers to cancel the meeting with Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono and condemning the MSG for failing to heed the wishes of the West Papuan people to join the MSG.

Despite the earlier pledge to support West Papuan independence, following the meeting with Yudhoyono in Jakarta on 15 January, the MSG delegation made it clear it would not interfere in Indonesia's "internal affairs".

In a joint statement, Indonesia and the MSG concluded they "supported respective sovereignty, unity and territorial integrity and the principle of non-interference in each other's internal affairs, consistent with the Charter of the United Nations". PNG's Pato said they had formed "a definite opinion" on "a certain" membership bid that would be forwarded to the MSG leadership.

Vanuatu's Natapei believes it is now unlikely that the WPNCL will obtain MSG membership. "Considering that the three [other] leaders of MSG have been in Indonesia and they have entered into some agreements with the government of Indonesia, I believe it's going to be a lot more difficult this time to try and push this agenda forward", he told Radio Australia.

West Papuans 'beaten and had guns held to head' in military operation

The Guardian (Australia) - February 3, 2014

Marni Cordell – Villagers in a remote West Papuan town have described being beaten and having guns pointed at their heads during a "terrifying" police and military operation at a local church.

One victim, who spoke to Guardian Australia but asked not to be named because of fear for his safety, said Indonesian police and military officers herded villagers into a church in Dondobaga, in the mountainous Puncak Jaya region of West Papua, early on a Sunday morning and told them they would be killed.

Villagers were woken and ordered to enter the church at 3am, according to the victim. There they were interrogated about their involvement with the separatist Free Papua Movement (OPM), threatened and beaten with the butts of rifles, he said.

"At 3am the military woke us up and ordered all of us to enter the church building. At 10am we were ordered to return outside to the churchyard and there we crouched for two hours.

"One by one we... were interrogated in the yard of the church. After two hours [the soldiers] told us, 'close your eyes'. They were going to shoot [us]." The victim said the villagers were saved by a military commander who "came from behind and said 'stop!'".

"Because of that we were saved. We had closed our eyes as the soldiers were going to shoot. "We were... surrounded by soldiers who were using guns," he said. "We were all terrified."

The victim said at least 200 police and army personnel were involved in the alleged operation and that seven villagers were arrested. "They were beaten up then taken away to the place of detention at the military post."

Among those detained were a church minister, office workers and local government department bureaucrats, he said. The victim said he and other villagers were kicked and beaten with rifle butts while detained in the church until midday on Sunday 26 January, and that they remained "very scared".

"The situation is not suitable yet to go into the town. The community is empty. There are five churches and they are also now empty," he said when Guardian Australia spoke to him on Tuesday. Two families were also forced at gunpoint to burn down their own houses, he said.

Guardian Australia approached the Indonesian embassy in Canberra about the alleged incidents, but a spokesperson declined to comment.

The chief of Puncak Jaya police, Marselis Sarimin, denied there was a siege at the church and said reports about violent conduct on behalf of the armed forces had been "exaggerated".

Sarimin said he and other officers were at the church in Dondobaga early on 26 January morning to investigate reports that someone had entered the building carrying a weapon. He said three people were arrested for questioning during the investigation but they had since been released.

"There were not seven people, they were only three people. The first one was released that day. The second was released the next day. There's no proof of anything that has been said. We released them all," he told Guardian Australia.

He denied civilians had been beaten and threatened at gunpoint. "If there are stories around the community that there was torture, it's lies," he said. "The news is exaggerated."

Sarimin said the town had since returned to normal. "The community here is as usual. They hear gunshots but that's usual here, because there's a TPN/OPM base here," he said. "I have worked in this area for five years now, so I know the reality. There's no problem here."

The alleged incident took place a day after members of the OPM attacked a local Indonesian military post and stole weapons and set alight a military vehicle. A soldier and a member of the OPM were then killed in a shootout, a local military commander told Indonesian media. Other reports said three guerrillas were killed in the fighting.

The OPM, which is waging an armed struggle for independence in West Papua, has claimed full responsibility for last Saturday's attack on the military post and said the targeting of civilians is unwarranted.

"We carried out all the actions as acts of resistance in Puncak Jaya, to decide our own destiny. It wasn't the community and church minister who they viciously treated that carried out those acts," a spokesperson for the OPM, Yunus Enumbi, told West Papuan news outlet Jubi.

"The church leader has never taught us to resist [the Indonesian government]. Those who are carrying out the true resistance are the TPN/OPM. We will not run away. We are at our headquarters. Come if you want and face us," he said.

TNI kill OPM member in Papua raid

Jakarta Globe - February 2, 2014

Banjir Ambarita, Jayapura – The Indonesian security forces killed one member of the Free Papua Movement (OPM) during a firefight in Yapen Waropen district on Saturday, arresting 11 others in the latest crackdown on the separatist group this restive province.

A joint security forces with the Papua Police and the Indonesian Military (TNI) staged a raid on a meeting of the OPM in Yapen Waropen on Saturday. When the security forces attempted to storm the meeting, the OPM members allegedly opened fire, injuring three people on the fight.

"We'd got an information that the group was holding a summit, so security officers led by the local police chief and the Yapen military commander headed to the location," Papua Police spokesman Sr. Comr. Pujo Sulistyo said on Saturday. "As soon as they arrived, though, they were welcomed with gunshots, so a firefight broke out."

One OPM member, 38-year-old Yohasua Arampay, was killed in the battle. "Eleven people have been arrested and they're now undergoing questioning," Pujo said.

The officers seized guns, bows and arrows and two Morning Star flags from the scene. The flag, the symbol of the Papuan independence movement, is banned in Indonesia.

Aceh

Hijab suggestion for non-Muslims in Aceh draws criticism

Jakarta Globe - February 7, 2014

Camelia Pasandaran, Jakarta – Human rights activists criticized the Aceh Shariah police on Friday for an official suggestion that non-Muslim women should wear the hijab in the semi-autonomous western region.

Banda Aceh Shariah Police on Wednesday detained 62 men and women for wearing improper clothes, releasing them the same day. Two were non- Muslims.

Samsuddin, the head of Aceh's Shariah Police Enforcement Office, said they should have been wearing the hijab as a sign of respect in the only province in Indonesia to enforce Shariah law. "Non-Muslims are also required to wear hijab, to respect Muslims in Aceh," he said, as quoted by news portal Merdeka.com.

Under a 2002 provincial Shariah bylaw, every Aceh resident is required to wear Islamic attire and women are required to wear the hijab and to avoid form-fitting attire. But the Shariah Police, before this week, only enforced the law for Muslims.

Samsuddin said those who violated the suggestion would be "educated" and sent on their way, but repeat offenders would be brought to an Aceh Shariah police office where parents or relatives would be required to pick them up.

Deputy Chairman of the National Human Rights Commission Imdadun said that the enforcement of the regulation for non-Muslims was a human rights violation and called on the Aceh government to put a stop to it.

"I call for the government not to continue such a policy," he said. "It will be a problem if other regions follow such an example. For instance, what if a majority Christian region such as Papua forces its residents, whether they're Christian or not, to wear crucifixes. This kind of policy is not appropriate to be implemented in Indonesia."

He said that Aceh's special autonomous status should have limitations. "They still need to obey the constitution and should not violate human rights," he said.

"Government officers did it just to keep the province as part of Indonesia," Bonar said. "The Aceh government, which fails to bring welfare to its people, plays the issue of Islamic Shariah to gain public support."

Aceh fully enforces sharia

Jakarta Post - February 7, 2014

Hotli Simanjuntak and Ina Parlina, Banda Aceh/Jakarta – Without much fanfare, the Aceh provincial administration and legislative council have approved the Qanun Jinayat (behavior-governing bylaw) that obliges every Muslim and non-Muslim in Aceh to follow sharia, the Islamic legal code.

"The qanun does indeed oblige everyone in Aceh to follow sharia without exception," councilor Abdulah Saleh, who was involved in the deliberation of the qanun in the council, confirmed on Thursday.

The Qanun Jinayat was approved by the legislative council on Dec. 13 and signed by Governor Zaini Abdullah. It was a revision of the controversial 2009 Qanun Jinayat that introduced the punishment of stoning to death.

Following outcry from human rights activists, the provincial administration under then governor Irwandi Yusuf refused to sign or implement the bylaw and it was deliberated again under the new administration.

Saleh said that the newly approved qanun stipulated that all violators of sharia would be tried under Islamic law regardless of their religion. Non- Muslim violators of the Criminal Code (KUHP) would be given the option to choose between a sharia court or a regular court, he explained.

"But, if the violation committed by a non-Muslim is not regulated in the KUHP then the violator will automatically be tried in a sharia court, without exception," Saleh said.

Violations of sharia that are not mentioned in the KUHP include drinking liquor, khalwat (affectionate contact between an unmarried couple), and not wearing headscarf or wearing tight pants by women.

Anyone found drinking alcohol or breaching the codes on moral behavior, whether residents or visitors to Aceh, could face between six and nine lashes of the cane.

On Wednesday, the Aceh sharia police stopped motorists but let non-Muslim women go after advising them to wear a headscarf. Three violations of the dress code could lead to nine lashes. The qanun also applies to military personnel as long as the military court does not regulate sharia violations.

Saleh argued that the passing of the qanun was based on the principle of justice for all as Muslims would feel they were being treated unfairly if non-Muslim violators were not tried under the same law for the same violations.

"It would be unfair if Muslims were punished while non-Muslims were not, just because sharia violations are not stipulated in the Criminal Code," Saleh said.

Meanwhile, a Banda Aceh resident opposed the qanun. "I'm of Chinese descent and not a Muslim, why should I obey Islamic teachings? As far as I know the headscarf is for Muslim women," said the man, a Buddhist, who declined to be identified.

Legal observer and social scientist at Syiah Kuala University in Banda Aceh, Saifuddin Bantasyam, said that although he had not yet read the Qanun Jinayat in detail, he thought that it would be awkward if Islamic law was applied to non-Muslims regardless of whether the violation was categorized as a sharia violation.

"If that was the case then we have to see first whether the qanun is implemented using the principle of individuality or the principle of territoriality," Saifuddin said.

If based on the principle of individuality, he said, then Islamic law applied only to Muslims. If based on the principle of territoriality, then whoever was in Aceh would have to follow Islamic law just as it is implemented in Arab and sharia-based Islamic countries.

With regard to the right to choose between an Islamic court and a criminal court for non-Muslims, according to Saifuddin, non-Muslims would consider that unfair.

Home Ministry spokesman Didik Suprayitno said his office had yet to receive information regarding Aceh's bylaw. However, he added, "basically all local regulations must be in line with national laws". Moreover, he said, all local regulations would be reviewed first by his office.

Key articles in the Qanun Jinayat

1. The sharia authorities will have the power to arrest suspected violators, and confiscate and conduct raids on their property, based on preliminary evidence.
2. The authorities will have the power to detain a violator for up to 30 days prior to trial. This detention can be extended by another 30 days.
3. A suspect has the right to be defended by a lawyer.
4. Non-Muslim or military suspects will be tried in a sharia court unless the violation is covered by the Criminal Code (KUHP) or by the Military Code respectively.
5. Even if the sharia court acquits a defendant, he or she will be required to undergo rehabilitation.
6. Only one appeal may be filed with the sharia court.
7. Prison terms are for up to a maximum of 40 months.
8. Caning up to a maximum to 40 lashes.
9. Fines up to a maximum of 800 grams of gold.

[Aceh provincial administration.]

Aceh mulls sharia for non-Muslims

Jakarta Post - February 6, 2014

Hotli Simanjuntak, Banda Aceh – The Aceh Legislative Council is deliberating a special bylaw that will force non-Muslims in the province to follow sharia.

Locally called Qanun Jinayat (a bylaw governing behavior), the measure would require all residents to follow Islamic code of dress and conduct.

In preparing for the measure, head of the Aceh Sharia Enforcement Office Samsuddin said on Wednesday his office was currently increasing raids on the streets to reduce sharia violations, including by non-Muslims.

In Banda Aceh on Wednesday, two women riding motorcycles were stopped by sharia police for not wearing a headscarf. Since they were not Muslims, the women were allowed to go, but with a warning to start covering their heads in public.

"We hope all women, including non-Muslims, will wear a headscarf," Samsuddin said. He added that both Muslims and non-Muslims living in Aceh, the only province governed by sharia, should obey Islamic law.

In addition to stopping bare-headed women, sharia police officers also stopped male motorists – Muslim or non – wearing shorts, warning them to only go out in public wearing long pants.

According to Qanun No. 11/2002, in public spaces women must wear a headscarf and men are forbidden from wearing shorts above the knee. "If someone is found in violation [of the Qanun] three times, they might receive harsh punishment, such as being caned in public," Samsuddin said.

Many residents disagree with applying sharia to those of other faiths. "It would be weird if we forced Islamic law on non-Muslims," said Hendrawan, a resident of Banda Aceh.

He said non-Muslims should only be subject to national law, which still applied in the semi-autonomous province of Aceh. "It's oppression of people of other beliefs," he said.

Commenting on the province's decision to apply sharia to non-Muslims, the chairwoman of the National Commission on Violence Against Women (Komnas Perempuan), Yunianti Chuzaifah, said some Qanun violated human rights.

"Forcing women, and religious minorities, to follow certain Qanun violates human rights," Yunianti told The Jakarta Post on Wednesday.

She said women had autonomy over their bodies and identity and the right to practice their beliefs. "The Constitution guarantees these rights, which is in accordance with basic human rights."

Regulating the dress and behavior of residents, particularly women, has become the focus of several Qanun. Last year, the city of Lhokseumawe banned women from sitting in the straddle position when riding on the back of a motorbike. In other regencies, local Qanun have been passed forbidding women from wearing pants.

Human rights activists have criticized the draft of the bylaw, one of the articles of which clearly states that a person who commits adultery could face 100 cane lashes, or death.

Overzealous implementation of sharia has at times had high human cost. In 2012, a teenage girl in East Aceh was arrested by sharia police at a nighttime music show in the company of male relatives for suspected prostitution. The shame of the allegation drove her to commit suicide.

Human rights & justice

Act of Killing' co-director says film not a foreign plot

Jakarta Globe - February 3, 2014

Jakarta – The co-director of the film, "The Act of Killing" denied that it was a foreign effort to tarnish Indonesia's reputation in international eyes, saying a negative image does not derive from an effort to dig and reveal incidents in the past but that it depended on what was being done today.

"For us, an image is not a matter of how well a crime against humanity was hidden from the people. A negative image is when unfairness and impunity is being sustained. Negative image is when there was no apology conveyed to the victims and families of the victims of the crimes against humanity," the anonymous co-director said in a press release sent to the Jakarta Globe.

The co-director said that a negative image is when the government did not rehabilitate or give compensation to the victims for everything that has been taken away from them and to continue to hide important facts from the public.

"A negative image is to make the architect of the mass killing a hero. A negative image is when there is an absence of efforts to start a true reconciliation process but instead displayed a fake reconciliation that basically contained a process to forget and made it as if it was the only possible way," the co-director said.

The co-director also said what was being described in the film was not merely the opinion of the foreign crew in the film production but also the Indonesian crew in the spirit to uphold humanity and solidarity to all victims of human rights violations.

The co-director explained that the reason the Indonesian crew wanted to remain anonymous was because they thought that the state was still unable to provide sufficient protection for them.

"We cannot register our film as an Indonesian movie because our anonymity doesn't allow us to set up a company and there was also no guarantee that the production house of our film would be safe and free from any violence," the release said.

The document added that the film was aimed not only to describe what really happened during the dark times in Indonesia but Joshua Oppenheimer, the director who is an American national, also demanded his government admit its role in the massacre.

It added that Oppenheimer wanted the American moviegoers to recognize the "The Act of Killing" as a movie that described how US foreign policy was protecting US-based companies in exploiting other countries by providing impunity against human rights violations in the countries where these companies operate.

On Jan. 16 the first film focused exclusively on Indonesian history was nominated in the best documentary category in the 86th Academy Awards. The nomination was the latest in a long list of accolades for Joshua Oppenheimer's documentary exposing the atrocities of the 1965 Communist Party purge that left as many as a million people dead in a bloody wave of violence.

The chilling documentary has been screened at some 120 international film festivals, netting 32 awards and earning praise from critics worldwide. But in Indonesia the film has received a cold reception from government officials, who see the documentary as an embarrassment; a dangerous film that fails to portray an accurate picture of the modern nation.

"[Indonesia] is portrayed as a cruel and lawless nation," said Teuku Faizasyah, the presidential spokesman for foreign affairs. "The film portrayed Indonesia as backwards, as in the 1960s. That is not appropriate, not fitting. It must be remembered [that] Indonesia has gone through a reformation. Many things have changed."

Muslim scholar awarded top human-rights prize

Jakarta Globe - February 1, 2014

Miko Napitupulu – Muslim scholar Dawam Rahardjo was awarded Indonesia's annual Yap Thiam Hien prize for human rights in Jakarta on Thursday.

Dawam, now a rector at the Universitas Proklamasi 45 in Yogyakarta, was given the award because of his record of defending the rights of minorities, especially religious minorities such as Ahmadi Muslims, Shiites and Christians, according to Todung Mulya Lubis, head of the Yap Thiam Hien foundation.

"The issue of [human rights] issue is being overlooked amid buzz of this year's election," Todung said, adding that the plight of minorities was not on the agenda of most of Indonesia's political establishment. "Why would they defend the minority?" he said. "What's in it for them?"

In his acceptance speech, Dawan said he had found advocating for minority group to have been a lonely battle much of the time, and said he had frequently been subject to negative campaigning. "With all those insults, I felt lonely. I felt alone," the 73-year-old said.

Born in Solo, Central Java, Dawam was a central figure in the country's second-largest Muslim organization, Muhammadiyah, until he was kicked out of the in 2006 for a strong push for pluralism. "With this award, I don't feel lonely anymore defending the minorities," Dawam said.

The Yap Thiam Hien Award is named after a Chinese-Indonesian human rights activist. It is awarded to an individual or organization each year. Tempo Magazine was named last year's winner.

Freedom of speech & expression

Tan Malaka book discussion shut down after protests by Islamic vigilantes

Tempo - February 7, 2014

Edwin Fajerial, Surabaya – A book discussion on Tan Malaka that was due to be held at the C-20 Library on Number 20 Jl. Cipto in the East Java provincial capital of Surabaya was eventually canceled because it failed to obtain permission from local police.

Beyond the library fence some 20 members of an Islamic mass organisation calling themselves the United Islamic People's Movement (GUIB), who had arrived in four cars shortly after evening prayers, closed off all access in and out of the library.

GUIB leader Dhofir said that they arrived in order to confirm that the Tan Malaka discussion had been closed down. According Dhofir, the discussion would have caused unrest because it preached Marxism or communism, which is considered to be the teachings of one who fights against Islam (kafir harbi) and must be fought. "Stay away from people who follow it", said Dhofir on Friday February 7.

When asked about a similar event held at the Airlangga University that morning, Dhofir stated that it did not conflict with religion because it was a scholarly book dissertation on campus. "If it is related to science it's allowed, [but] if it's being disseminated it's not allowed", he said.

The Obor Book Foundation is holding a series of discussions on a new book titled "Tan Malaka, Left Wing Movement, and the Indonesian Revolution" Volume 4 by renowned Dutch historian Harry A. Poeze. A discussion on the book attended by Poeze was to be held at the C-20 Library on Friday. Similar events are being held in several different cities while in Surabaya, book dissertations were also held at the Surabaya State University and the Airlangga University.

Tegalsari sectoral police chief Commissioner Arief Mukti said that in principle police always give permission for such events providing that the do not disrupt public order and security. If they are deemed to be disruptive police will suggest the event be cancelled. "We are also the ones who can close it down if indeed it does goes ahead", said Mukti.

Outside the library meanwhile, a number of people intending to join the discussion were still arriving. Tempo estimated that there were around 30 people assembled not far from the GUIB blockade who said they did not know that the discussion had been cancelled.

One of the participants, Airlangga University post-graduate student Abdul Khodir, said that he regretted the closure of the book dissertation because discussions of the Tan Malaka book were essential in order to complement a historical insight into the nation. "I've very disappointed that it was cancelled", said Khodir.

The event organising committee, who could not be seen anywhere, did indeed take a decision to cancel the event earlier in the afternoon after they failed to receive permission for the event from police. The library was padlocked and the lights inside the building turned off. A piece of paper announcing the cancellation of the book dissertation was posted on the library gates.

[Slightly abridged translation by James Balowski.]

Twitter celebrity found guilty of defamation for PKS tweets

Jakarta Globe - February 5, 2014

Markus Junianto Sihaloho & Camelia Pasandaran, Jakarta – A popular Indonesian blogger and minor Twitter celebrity has been sentenced to one year of probation over libelous tweets aimed at a former lawmaker.

The judges at the South Jakarta Court ruled that Benny Handoko – Twitter handle @benhan – was guilty of defaming Muhammad Misbakun, a member of the Prosperous Justice Party (PKS).

"Defendant Benny Handoko has been proven legally and convincingly guilty of committing a crime," chief justice Suprapto said on Wednesday. "[The court] sentences defendant Benny Handoko to six months in jail, under the condition that he does not have to serve the sentence unless he commits another crime before his one-year probation term ends."

The judge also ordered Benny to pay Rp 60,000 ($4.92) for the court administration fee. The sentence is lighter than the two years' probation, with the option of one year in jail, requested by the prosecutor.

Misbakhun reported Benny to the police in December 2012 for a tweet that accused the PKS member of stealing money from Bank Century, the now-defunct bank at the center of a 2008 government bailout scandal.

Benny also wrote that Misbakhun was the operator of an anonymous Twitter account that spread lies, and that he was an employee of the tax office of the Finance Ministry when the bureau was frequently accused of corruption.

Misbakhun was sentenced in 2010 to two years in jail for forging documents to obtain loans from Bank Century. He resigned from the PKS after being named a suspect in the case and subsequently lost his seat at the House of Representatives.

In July 2012, the Supreme Court overturned the 2010 conviction, meaning Misbakhun should not have been imprisoned in the first place. Misbakhun therefore argued that the tweet from @benhan calling him a thief was libelous.

Misbakhun, using his twitter account @misbakhun, asked Benny to apologize, which, he said, would be sufficient for him to not file a police complaint. Benny refused, however, and continued to round on Misbakhun on the Internet.

Police named Benny a suspect on May 13, 2013. He was charged with defamation under Article 27 of the Electronic Information and Transaction (ITE) Law.

Prosecutor Fahmi Iskandar said that he would take time to consider the ruling before deciding whether or not to appeal. "We will mull it over for seven days before coming up with a response," Fahmi said.

He said the prosecution had successfully proven Benny's guilt despite a massive outpour of support for Benny on various social media. "This is not about [being] satisfied or not, but proved right or wrong, and the prosecutor's indictment has been proven," Fahmi said. "If the defendant decides to appeal, we're ready to face it."

Benny, who currently counts 53.6 thousand followers on Twitter, said he was disappointed by the ruling, which, according to him, did not take into consideration the facts he had presented to the court.

He said that the prosecutor could not prove the validity of the printed out tweets presented to the court as hard evidence, adding that the printouts should have been compared to the data stored by Twitter.

"This can't be proven by the prosecutor, and it was not considered by the judge," Benny said. Benny has not decided whether or not to file appeal.

Misbakhun told the Jakarta Globe on Wednesday that he was sad that Benny had been given a criminal record, as an apology would have been sufficient to preclude legal action.

"But that simple request was not fulfilled by Benny Handoko," he said. "So there was no option but to take legal proceedings. I chose that step to maintain my dignity and the dignity of my wife, children, parents and extended family."

The former lawmaker said the verdict should be a lesson for others to use social media responsibly. "The ruling is proof that someone used Twitter as a medium to defame another's good reputation with a libelous tweet... the content was incorrect, full of prejudice and hatred and not based on facts," he said.

"As a democratic country, Indonesia in the Constitution guarantees freedom of expression for all citizens. But please remember that that freedom does not come without regulation: there are rights for other citizens whose dignity and reputation should be maintained."

'Minang atheist' Aan released from prison

Jakarta Post - February 1, 2014

Jakarta – Alexander Aan, who was sentenced to two-and-a-half years in prison in 2012 for publicly declaring himself an atheist on Facebook, was released from prison on Jan. 27.

Aan, a 30-year-old former civil servant, posted statements and pictures on the social networking site stating he was a member of the Minang atheist Facebook group, which some considered insulting to Islam and the Prophet Muhammad.

On Jan. 20, 2012, Aan was charged under Article 28(2) of the Electronic Information and Transaction Law for disseminating information aimed at inciting religious hostility and under Criminal Code articles 156a(a) and 156a(b) for blasphemy and for encouraging others to embrace atheism. Aan was also fined Rp 100 million (US$8,190).

Christian Solidarity Worldwide (CSW), an NGO focusing on religious freedom, said in a press statement that it had visited Aan in prison twice while investigating violations of freedom of religion or belief and threats to religious harmony in Indonesia. CSW had advocated for Aan's release.

Benedict Rogers of CSW said Aan's release was a huge relief and he urged the government to seriously consider reviewing the Blasphemy Law and other pieces of legislation that violated freedom of thought, conscience, religion or belief.

"We hope Indonesia will protect, promote and expand the principles of religious pluralism set out in Pancasila so that they apply equally to all Indonesians and ensure that no one is unjustly imprisoned for their beliefs in the future."

Political parties & elections

Tommy has his eye on the presidency in 2019

Jakarta Post - February 7, 2014

Jakarta – The little-known National Republic (Nasrep) Party may not be contesting this year's legislative election but it has a big plans for 2019.

A national leadership meeting of the party on Wednesday decided that the party's chief patron Hutomo Mandala Putra would be the party's presidential candidate in the 2019 race.

Hutomo, better known as Tommy Soeharto, is the youngest son of former president Soeharto who ruled the country under his authoritarian New Order regime for 32 years. "We are certain that we can nominate him. Because there's so many people who still love Soeharto," party chairperson Neneng A. Tuty said.

Neneng added that apart from nominating Tommy, the party also had other plans for 2019, including building a coalition with other parties. "We are going to build a good internal mentoring system for our membership, also build networks with other parties and form supporting wings," she said.

Neneng was optimistic that the party could capitalize on the fondness of some voters for Soeharto and the party will systematically run campaigns to raise public awareness about the glory of his era.

One indication of popular nostalgia for the Soeharto era is the circulation of posters and stickers of Soeharto captioned with the question in Javanese: "Piye kabare? Iseh penak jamanku to?" which roughly translates as "How's things? It was better in my time, eh?"

In a bid to woo voters from the lower-income bracket, the party has also drawn up platforms which include the empowerment of small enterprises in agriculture and fisheries to achieve national self-sufficiency in food supplies, one of the major goals of Soeharto's development plan.

The Nasrep party was formed in 2011 and was deemed by the General Election Commission (KPU) ineligible to contest the 2014 legislative election.

The party has a number of controversial figures sitting on its executive boards including Muchdi Prawiro Pranjono, the former deputy of National Intelligence Agency (BIN), who was implicated, although later acquitted, in the murder of Munir.

Munir was a human rights activist who campaigned for investigations into the disappearance of pro-democracy activists during the twilight of the New Order regime.

Muchdi is not the only executive to have had legal problems. In 2002, Tommy himself was sentenced to 15 years in prison, although he served only four years, for masterminding the murder of Syafiuddin Kartasasmita, a Supreme Court judge.

Syafiuddin had sentenced Tommy to 18 months in prison and ordered him to pay Rp 30.6 billion (US$2.5 million) fines in a land-swap case involving State Logistics Agency (Bulog) and PT Goro Batara Sakti, a retail company.

Tommy is not the only family member to try their luck in politics. His sister Siti Hardiyanti Rukmana Tutut was a presidential candidate for her party, the National Functional Party (PKPB), while Ari Sigit was a presidential candidate for his party, the Functional Republic Party (PAKAR).

Another sibling, Siti Hediyati Hariyadi, better known as Titiek, who is divorced from Great Indonesia Movement (Gerindra) Party chief patron Lt. Gen. (ret) Prabowo Subianto, will run in the legislative election on a Golkar party ticket in one of Yogyakarta's electoral districts. (gda)

Golkar denies nomination of Titiek

Jakarta Post - February 6, 2014

Jakarta – Chairman of the Golkar Party Advisory Council, Akbar Tanjung, denied that the party had considered nominating the daughter of former president Soeharto, Siti Hediati "Titiek" Hariyadi as a running mate for party chairman Aburizal Bakrie in the 2014 presidential election.

Akbar said there had never been talks about pairing Aburizal with Titiek. "Titiek is only a legislative candidate representing Yogyakarta – We never had discussions about nominating her as vice presidential candidate," Akbar said, as quoted by tribunnews.com.

Akbar also said that finding a running mate for Aburizal would be discussed after the April 9 legislative election. The Golkar Party has officially nominated Aburizal as its presidential candidate in 2014.

Analysts said that Golkar, currently the country's second-biggest party based on parliamentary seats, would remain strong in the legislative election. However, they added it would be difficult for the party to win the presidency, regardless of the legislative result, given Aburizal's tarnished image.

Anas throws more dirt, opens pandora's box

Jakarta Post - February 5, 2014

Haeril Halim, Jakarta – Ousted Democratic Party (PD) chairman Anas Urbaningrum ramped up his attacks against current party chief President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono.

Speaking through his lawyer Firman Wijaya, Anas – who was questioned by the Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK) on Wednesday as a suspect in the Hambalang sports complex graft – said Yudhoyono had once instructed him to "safeguard" the Bank Century bailout discussions at the House of Representatives, while he was chairman of the party in the House.

The order to "safeguard" was interpreted by Anas as a damage control command to prevent other members of the ruling party from being implicated in the case.

The Bank Century bailout, which was subsequently deemed illegal by the House, was believed to be part of a clandestine scheme to channel government funds to help finance the Democratic Party's legislative election and Yudhoyono's reelection bid in 2009.

"During today's questioning, Anas told the KPK investigators about the 'special task' assigned to him when he was party faction chairman at the House. I think the current investigation will bring wider consequences," Firman said at the KPK headquarters on Wednesday.

In Wednesday's questioning, KPK investigators pressed Anas on the funds allegedly flowed from the Hambalang project to the fund the party's 2010 congress in Bandung, West Java, during which Anas was elected chairman.

"At first Anas was questioned in his capacity as a party chairman candidate during the congress, but the investigation developed into unearthing information on the 'special task' assigned to Anas," Firman said.

Firman further said that Anas' legal team would soon present "surprising facts" to the KPK to help investigators expedite the investigation.

"It's just a matter of time, just wait and see. It may be a photo or something," he said. Another of Anas' lawyers, Handika Honggowongso, said recently that Anas was once briefed directly by Yudhoyono to carry out a "special task".

"Anas must make sure that the scandal does not blown up because the allegations could have a huge impact on Yudhoyono's administration, considering that an inquiry committee has been established [to look into the irregularities in the bailout]," Handika said on Jan. 26.

Responding to the claim, KPK spokesman Johan Budi said that Anas could still have more information on other people involved in the Hambalang sports complex, or any other graft cases for that matter.

"Investigators will record Anas' testimony in his dossier and the investigators will follow up what Anas had said as long as there is enough evidence," Johan said.

According to audits by the Supreme Audit Agency (BPK), the state lost Rp 463.66 billion (US$38 million) in the Hambalang project, while the Century bailout scandal resulted in Rp 7.4 trillion in state losses.

In recent months calls have mounted for the KPK to summon Yudhoyono's youngest son Edhie "Ibas" Baskoro, given his position on the steering committee for the congress.

"Mas Ibas was the head of the steering committee. If the KPK wants to know about the congress, Ibas should be questioned," Anas said last week, adding that Ibas was also a member of Andi Mallarangeng's campaign team in the congress. Andi, who was also a suspect in the case, lost to Anas in the congress.

Soon after his arrest by the KPK, Anas made a thinly-veiled attack on Yudhoyono by thanking him for his detention. Prior to his arrest Anas said that his fight had only just begun and that he would soon usher in a new chapter in the saga.

Golkar mulls long-term alliance with PDI-P

Jakarta Post - February 4, 2014

Bagus BT Saragih and Margareth S. Aritonang, Jakarta – The prospect of the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P) winning the 2014 legislative election has prompted rival political parties to hatch plans to build a coalition with the party.

The Golkar Party – which according to a number of public opinion polls, stands a good chance of coming in second place in the 2014 legislative election – has openly expressed its interest in joining forces with the opposition party.

On Monday, respected Golkar politician Hajriyanto Thohari said that the party was considering building a long-term coalition with the PDI-P.

Hajriyanto said that his party had given thought to forming a "strong and permanent" coalition with the PDI-P for "at least five [general] elections". "I think 2014 is the perfect momentum to realize this desire," he told reporters.

Hajriyanto said the country's political landscape would be "stable but dynamic" under a Golkar-PDI-P alliance as the two parties would form a majority in the House of Representatives.

He claimed that it would also be easy for the two parties to coalesce given their nationalist platforms. "We are two of the country's oldest parties. We both have similar nationalistic platforms. So the next question is why not?" he said.

Hajriyanto's statement came only days after PDI-P secretary-general Tjahjo Kumolo acknowledged that the PDI-P chairperson, former president Megawati Soekarnoputri, met with Golkar chairman and presidential candidate Aburizal Bakrie. No details were released about the meeting.

Golkar members have expressed the hope that the party would build an alliance with the PDI-P, Hajriyanto said. "But we can't make it happen right away because Golkar is currently in a coalition pact with the ruling Democratic Party [PD]," he said.

Golkar is currently the biggest ally of President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono's PD, but in the past few years Golkar has often engaged in political collaboration with the PDI-P in the House to challenge Yudhoyono's policies.

Another member of the government coalition, the Prosperous Justice Party (PKS) has also made similar moves. However, unlike the PKS which lost one of its Cabinet posts due to its "rebellious" acts, Golkar ministers have remained, thanks to intensive diplomacy by the party's seasoned politicians.

Tjahjo refused to comment on Golkar's "invitation" to form a permanent coalition. "We haven't thought about a coalition yet. We are still focusing on the legislative election," he said.

Separately, PDI-P lawmaker Arif Wibowo said the party did not want "to be dictated" to by others when it came to coalitions. "If we win the legislative election, we will have a free hand in forming a coalition for the presidential race," he said.

Arya Fernandes, a political analyst with Charta Politika, said that it would be difficult for two parties with a similar degree of electoral support to form a coalition. "A strong party usually accepts smaller parties in an alliance to maintain its control," he said.

Aceh, Papua most prone to election conflict: Police

Jakarta Post - February 4, 2014

Yuliasri Perdani, Jakarta – The National Police have warned that Aceh and Papua could be hot spots for communal conflict during the upcoming general election.

The police's security maintenance chief, Comr. Gen. Badrodin Haiti, said on Monday that rampant arms trafficking and rivalry between political parties had made Aceh vulnerable to violent clashes during the election period.

"In the aftermath of the conflict [with the Free Aceh Movement or GAM], many illegal arms have been distributed among locals. There are also some political parties engaged in conflict," he said on Monday.

Badrodin was apparently referring to the Aceh Party (PA) and the Aceh National Party (PNA), which were both founded by former GAM combatants following the 2005 Helsinki agreement that ended their 30-year fight.

In the last six months, there have been at least three incidents involving PA and PNA members. The latest incident happened in January when PA supporters stormed and assaulted Ramli, a PNA supporter, after trashing PA flags.

In the same month, a PNA member, Jufrizal, was abducted and beaten by unidentified men after he flew PNA flags around his neighborhood in Lhokseumawe.

"We will take the persuasive and preventive approaches. We urge leaders of the parties to take part in holding peaceful elections. It will be good if the Aceh Police initiate the declaration on peaceful elections with them," Badrodin said.

Aside from Aceh, the National Police are also keeping an eye on Papua. In recent months, spate of shooting accidents and violent attacks occurred, which the police claimed to have been perpetrated by Free Papua Movement (OPM) rebels.

Badrodin added that aside from Aceh and Papua, the police would also focus their election security operation in North Sumatra, South Sumatra, Java, South Sulawesi, Southeast Sulawesi, Maluku and North Maluku.

However, the police will likely face challenges in providing security measures as the government has turned down their request for more financial support.

National Police chief Gen. Sutarman said that the police were preparing to set aside Rp 600 billion (US$49 million) from their annual budget to support the security operation.

He said that the police had taken the measure as the government only provided around a quarter of the requested budget of Rp 3.59 trillion.

"The government prepared Rp 1 trillion, but we have decided that we need at least Rp 1.6 trillion for the operation. So, we must rearrange the police budget allocation for the election security operation," he said.

Some police officials have raised concerns that the Rp 1 trillion budget would barely cover the operation, which will run for 224 days from March until the inauguration of the president elect in October.

Dems, ignoring polls, back Gita over Joko

Jakarta Globe - February 3, 2014

Carlos Paath, Jakarta – Democratic Party officials have played down poll results that indicate none of the 11 men vying for the party's presidential nomination would stand a chance in the July election against Jakarta Governor Joko Widodo, a member of the main opposition party.

Ramadhan Pohan, a deputy secretary general of the ruling party, said on Monday that Gita Wirjawan, who resigned as trade minister last Friday to focus on his presidential bid with the Democrats, had more experience and a better track record than Joko.

"His experience at the national level is complete, from being the head of the investment coordinating board, to the trade minister, to the chairman of the badminton association," Ramadhan said.

"He even has international experience. He would sink Joko. He's also younger, to boot." He said that Gita's decision to resign from the cabinet would only boost his focus and his popularity.

"This is an important moment. His electability and his popularity will take off. People will see Gita as someone who is not power-hungry, not egotistical," Ramadhan said.

"The next couple of months will see a lot of politicial turbulence in terms of presidential candidates. It started with Gita, and it's now up to Dahlan and the others to take note," he added, referring to Dahlan Iskan, the minister for state-owned enterprises, who is also taking part in the Democrats' presidential convention.

Ruhut Sitompul, a Democrat legislator, said separately that he was convinced the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P), the country's main opposition bloc, would nominate its chairwoman, Megawati Soekarnoputri, over Joko.

He said Megawati, who lost to the Democrats' Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono in both the 2004 and 2009 elections, would be a "more realistic" choice than the largely untested Joko, who has not held an executive position at the national level.

"Joko should just stick to taking care of the floods," Ruhut said, referring to the floods that have plagued parts of Jakarta since mid- January. The PDI-P, which surveys say has a sure bet in Joko, has in recent weeks indicated that it may once again put Megawati on the ticket.

Pollsters have questioned the wisdom of such a move, given the chairwoman's polarizing nature and the fact that Joko consistently polls better than her or any other potential presidential candidate.

In the latest poll, conducted by the Indonesian Survey Circle (LSI) from Jan.6-16, some 35 percent of the 1,200 respondents polled said they would vote for Joko if the election were held today.

Megawati was a distant second with 22 percent, followed by Prabowo Subianto, the founder and chief patron of the Great Indonesia Movement Party (Gerindra), with 20 percent.

Adjie Alfaraby, an LSI researcher, said at the announcement of the results on Sunday that the numbers confirmed what other polls had noted before about Joko being the man to beat in the July 9 election.

The PDI-P, though, has made clear it will not announce its candidate until after the results from the April 9 legislative election are in.

Parties must win 25 percent of the legislative vote or 20 percent of seats at the House of Representatives to be eligible to nominate a presidential candidate.

The LSI poll showed that the PDI-P and the Golkar Party would come out on top in the legislative election, with 18 percent of votes each, in line with projections by earlier surveys.

That could theoretically give them the required 20 percent of House seats, once votes to parties that miss the 3.5 percent threshold needed for a House seat are farmed out, allowing them to nominate their respective candidates without having to take on a coalition partner.

The Democrats, however, are expected to fare far worse, with the LSI poll giving the ruling party less than 5 percent of the vote. Adjie said that none of the 11 Democrats vying for the party's nomination would get more than 5 percent in the presidential election, even if the party managed to get enough votes to qualify.

PPP likely to nominate Suryadharma Ali as presidential candidate

Jakarta Globe - February 3, 2014

The United Development Party (PPP) is unlikely to break from tradition and will nominate its party chairman as its presidential candidate for the upcoming national election, a senior PPP official said.

The announcement of Religious Affairs Minister Suryadharma Ali as the party's candidate will likely be made at the PPP conference in Bandung, West Java, at the end of this week.

"The possibility is Suryadharma, he's the best in the PPP," deputy chairman of the party Irgan Chairul Mahfiz said, as quoted by news portal Kompas.com on Monday. "It's a tradition in PPP that the chairman should be the [candidate]," he said.

Before any official announcement, the PPP will hear the views of the party board, ulema and other senior figures and party faithful during the national meeting. Suryadharma said he did not know whether he would be nominated by the party.

"I don't know," Suryadharma said, as quoted by the state-run news agency Antara on Monday, before adding the matter was in God's hands. "But everyday there are people, ulema and public figure advising me to contest the election."

PKB, declining in polls, 'serious' about nominating Kalla

Jakarta Globe - February 3, 2014

Markus Junianto Sihaloho – The National Awakening Party, or PKB, insists it is seriously mulling backing former vice president Jusuf Kalla for the presidential election, despite polls giving it no chance of winning enough votes to be eligible to nominate a candidate.

Marwan Jafar, the chairman of the party at the House of Representatives, said on Monday that party officials would discuss the matter with Nahdlatul Ulama, the country's biggest Islamic organization, from which the PKB was conceived.

"Of course the PKB is serious about the declaration of Jusuf Kalla as a presidential candidate," he said, but added that no definitive announcement about the party's candidate would be made before the legislative election in April.

Marwan said that in addition to consulting with NU, PKB officials would also carry out a series of internal survey to determine the best candidate.

Others being considered by the PKB are Mahfud M.D., the widely respected former chief justice of the Constitutional Court, and Rhoma Irama, a dangdut singer-turned-cleric notorious for his conservative Islamic rhetoric.

Kalla, a hugely popular vice president during President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono's first term, has been linked to various parties for the presidential election to July, with his own Golkar Party insisting it will nominate its chairman, Aburizal Bakrie.

The PKB has become the latest to join the fray, with 24 of its 33 provincial chapters declaring at a national caucus last Thursday that Kalla be considered alongside Mahfud and Rhoma as a potential presidential candidate.

For his part, the former vice president has welcomed the call, but stopped short of saying whether he would accept any of the proposed nominations thrown his way.

Greety Tielman, the head of the PKB's eastern Indonesia caucus, said last week that support for Kalla initially came from the party's eastern Indonesian chapters. Greety said that Kalla, a South Sulawesi native, was an experienced politician with a proven ability to lead.

But the question of the PKB's presidential candidate is likely to be moot, according to a slew of polls that show the party getting fewer than 6 percent of votes in the April 9 legislative election.

Under electoral law, a party or coalition must win 25 percent of votes in the legislative election or 20 percent of House seats to be eligible to nominate a candidate for the July 9 presidential election.

The PKB's support base has also dwindled over the years, due in part to a spat that saw former president Abdurrhman "Gus Dur" Wahid, its founder and then chairman, ousted by his nephew and the current party chief, Muhaimin Iskandar.

The PKB won 12.6 percent of votes in the 1999 election, the same year that Gus Dur became president, before declining to 10.5 percent in the 2004 election and 4.9 percent in 2009.

Islamic parties in general have also declined in recent surveys, with pollsters noting that the best they could hope for was a coalition with one of the major nationalist parties and a vice presidential slot.

A poll by the National Survey Institute (LSN) last November found Mahfud as the leading Islamic party candidate, with 16.4 percent of the 1,240 respondents polled saying they would vote for him.

Rhoma and Religious Affairs Minister Suryadharma Ali, from the National Development Party (PPP), were next with 9.6 percent and 9.1 percent, respectively.

In the same survey, 45.6 percent of respondents supported the merging of Islamic parties into a single coalition, a move expected to be useful in strengthening ties between Muslims across the nation and strengthening the conservative voter base.

Despite the evident public support, however, Syamsuddin Haris, a political analyst for the Indonesian Institute of Sciences (LIPI), remained pessimistic that much good could come out of such a coalition, citing the lack of a unifying figure like the late Gus Dur.

Ailing PKS seeking presidential nominee, alliance

Jakarta Post - February 1, 2014

Ina Parlina and Bagus BT Saragih, Jakarta – The leadership of the Prosperous Justice Party (PKS) on Friday kick-off a two-day meeting to decide who would be the party's presidential candidate.

The council is expected to choose from five potential candidates for the presidential race, who were elected recently in a nationwide election involving all party members.

The five men are party faction leader at the House of Representatives Hidayat Nur Wahid, party chairman Anis Matta, West Java Governor Ahmad Heryawan, Communications and Information Minister Tifatul Sembiring and Depok Mayor Nur Mahmudi Ismail.

The party, whose image was badly tarnished by the major scandal implicating its chief patron last year, is gearing up for the election and hopes that it can form an alliance with the major parties to boost its chances.

Political analyst Arie Sudjito of Yogyakarta's Gadjah Mada University said the PKS would not be able to meet the presidential threshold and field its own presidential candidate. The party, he said, was likely aiming for a vice presidential seat.

Studies revealed that the PKS would struggle just to reach the 3.5 percent national vote threshold required for the party to be eligible to secure seats at the House of Representatives. The presidential threshold is set at 20 percent of the popular vote.

In an attempt to improve its prospects in the election, the Muslim-based party has started communicating with other parties ahead of the April 9 legislative election.

Following a meeting with Golkar Party chairman Aburizal Bakrie last week, PKS chairman Anis Matta said he would hold meetings with People's Conscience (Hanura) Party's presidential hopeful former Indonesian Military (TNI) commander Gen. (ret.) Wiranto and Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P) chairperson Megawati Soekarnoputri.

"We need to open talks with all parties even though it may not necessarily lead to us forming an alliance for the next election," Anis said recently. He also claimed that he had met with leaders of the Nahdlatul Ulama and Muhammadiyah, the country's two largest Islamic organizations.

Arya Fernandes, a political analyst with Charta Politika, said that exploring the possibility of forming an alliance ahead the presidential election was inevitable for parties like the PKS. "They should start communicating with other parties right now," he said.

In the 2009 election, the PKS got 7.9 percent of the vote, making it the fourth largest faction at the House. The PKS is currently among the six parties in the coalition led by President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono's Democratic Party, which has also been hit hard by corruption scandals.

However, the ruling Democratic Party (PD) seems to have marginalized the Islamic party, given the numerous "rebellious" anti-government positions the PKS had taken at the House.

Despite the challenges facing the party today, Anis said he was still upbeat about his party's chances in the election. "Politics is a game and the PKS will be playing it as an attractive one, rather than a dangerous one. This game will be attractive, fun and exciting. This is how we improve our democracy," he said.

PDI-P secretary general Tjahjo Kumolo acknowledged Anis had requested for a meeting with Megawati. "But we haven't decided the time yet," said Tjahjo who later revealed that Megawati had also met with leaders of other parties, including Aburizal.

Surveys & opinion polls

Indonesians trust businesses more than government, survey shows

Jakarta Globe - February 5, 2014

Harriet Conron & Nicole Jade Millane, Jakarta – Businesses are the most trusted institutions in Indonesia ahead of the media, nongovernmental organizations and governments, according to a recent survey.

The 2014 Edelman trust barometer survey revealed a 10 percentage point increase in Indonesia's trust index, an aggregate of the nation's confidence across the four institutions.

This year, 82 percent of respondents put their trust in businesses compared to 78 percent for the media, 73 percent for NGOs and only 53 percent for government.

At the release of the survey this week, Stephen Lock, Edelman Indonesia chief executive and head of public affairs for South East Asia, said the results, indicating Indonesia's increasing trust in businesses "reflect faith in a strong economy."

"It suggests that people are looking to business leadership, to play a role in the development and change in the country, because they don't believe that government will make that change," he said.

The survey collected data from 33,000 respondents in 27 countries, polling the general population as well as a university-educated informed public. This is the 14th year of the annual global study, Indonesia has been included in the survey for the past six years.

In last year's Edelman survey, Indonesians labeled government officials or regulators as the least credible when compared with other professions. This year, their trust rating jumped six percentage points, to 53 percent from 47 percent last year, demonstrating a newfound belief in elected institutions.

Stephen Lock described the rise in trust levels for government in Indonesia as "unexpected."

Despite the rise, trust in government leadership remains poor in Indonesia. Just 14 percent of Indonesians trust government leaders to fix problems, and only 15 percent trust government leaders to tell the truth.

The survey found poor trust in government is common across the globe, and Indonesia is no exception. "This reflects a larger institutional failure of governments to connect with their populations," Lock said.

The nations that performed well in this category were not democratic countries. Chinese survey respondents had some of the highest levels of confidence in government's ability to make ethical decisions. "There is a general sense of malaise in worldwide democracies," Lock said.

He believes this can be accredited to two factors. The Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK), in its role to hold power to account, has been very visible in the past year. Secondly, the new generation of local leadership that has sprung up across the country, has engendered optimism about what government can achieve.

The survey revealed Indonesians strongly prioritize infrastructure development above all other roles for their government, including free market access. Forty-five percent of survey respondents rated updating the countries poor facilities as imperative while just 5 percent of respondents viewed free market access as a priority. This will create headaches for Indonesia as it is poised to enter the Asean Economic Community (AEC) next year.

With the 2014 election quickly approaching, Lock says "the government has an obligation to get the country ready for AEC at the end of 2015," and that the AEC will be a "nightmare" for whoever is in government following the elections.

Business leaders are still far more credible than government officials in Indonesian eyes, overall results showing that 82 percent of respondents put their trust in businesses, an increase of 8 percent from last year.

The Edelman survey shows Indonesians believe businesspeople are twice as likely to tell the truth, compared to government figures and more than three times more likely to correct issues in industries that are experiencing problems.

Indonesians' trust in business leaders was significantly higher than the rest of the world, the survey found. Indonesia ranked third, behind Brazil and India for confidence in business leaders, showing emerging markets are most likely to put their faith in corporations.

"That is a huge investment of trust in business leadership, and that tells us that Indonesians want their next government to be run much more like a business, to get things done," Lock said.

"Indonesians are really supportive of the role of business to be involved in policy and the direction of the country, but not to the extent that they want to deregulate and let business have a completely free hand."

Big businesses and publicly listed companies are viewed as more trustworthy than family or state-owned firms in the Indonesian market, according to the survey.

"Its kind of interesting because if you look at the last few years of the Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono government, most of the change it has tried to effect, in areas like infrastructure, has been through state-owned industries," Lock said.

The survey also found Indonesians are more likely to trust recognizable Western brands than their local counterparts. "There is still a residual well of trust that Indonesians have for big Western brands in preference for Indonesian brands," Lock said.

Trust in NGOs has also risen sharply from last year. More accountability, better standards and the rise of the "corporate NGO" may be driving this, the survey states. After three years of dropping confidence in NGO's, this year Indonesia's trust levels rose 22 percentage points to 73 percent from 51 percent last year.

Past mistrust of NGO's can be sourced to the lack of transparency about where they get their funding from and what they did with it, according to Lock. "One of the drivers is that we've seen a lot of big global donors switch off the tap for Indonesia," Lock said.

As Indonesia is now a middle-income country, international organizations are reducing aid relief and NGOs have to compete much harder for funding.

Trust in the media rose one percentage point to 78 percent from the 2013 results. Indonesia had the second-highest confidence level in the media out of the 27 countries surveyed.

Media & journalism

Groups threaten to bring KPI to court

Jakarta Post - February 1, 2014

Nurfika Osman, Jakarta – A group of civil society organizations, called the Frequency Belongs to the Public (FMP), plans to take the Indonesian Broadcasting Commission (KPI) to court as the commission failed to punish partisan TV stations.

FMP spokesman Roy Thaniago said the KPI had yet to show its commitment to upholding the neutrality of television broadcasting in Indonesia.

"They committed to take action against stations that air political advertisements by the end of this month, but there are still a lot of [political ads] being shown on TV. The KPI has [let] politicians control the broadcasting content," Roy told The Jakarta Post.

He said that the KPI's pledge had been made earlier this month after the FMP – which consists of more than 30 social organizations including the Information and Communication Technology Watch (ICT Watch), Indonesian Communication Student Association and private channel watchdog Remotivi – marched from the Hotel Indonesia traffic circle to the KPI's headquarters.

In the pledge, which was written outlined in an official-stamped document, the KPI said it would sanction television stations that aired political ads and provided excessive coverage of political candidates and parties by Jan. 31 at the latest.

"They need to fulfill their commitment because they were established by the state and paid by the people to prevent any party, group or interests to penetrate TV content. We are afraid that the public will eventually lose its trust for the KPI if they are weak," he said.

The "people" he was referring to were Golkar party presidential candidate Aburizal Bakrie, who owns TVOne and ANTV; People's Conscience (Hanura) Party vice presidential candidate Hary Tanoesoedibjo, who runs RCTI, Global TV and MNC TV; and National Democrat (NasDem) Party presidential candidate Surya Paloh, who owns the Metro TV channel.

He said that the KPI should have revoked the licenses of those channels as they had violated the 2002 Broadcasting Law. Reprimands and warnings were useless, he continued.

Contacted separately, KPI commissioner Agatha Lily said that the commission had been active over the past few weeks in its mission to make TV content balance and impartial. Agatha said they had recently sent every TV station, including local stations, a circular prohibiting political ads and campaigns.

"We did this because we have the responsibility to ensure reporting and content is balanced, we were not bowing to pressure from social organizations," Agatha told the Post.

She also said that the commission last week had sent second warnings to RCTI and Global TV, which had aired two quiz shows: "Kuis Kebangsaan" (Nationality Quiz) and "Indonesia Cerdas" (Indonesia Smart) that had campaigned for presidential hopeful Hanura chairman Gen. (ret) Wiranto and his running mate Tanoesoedibjo.

If the stations did not make any corrections to the quizzes, the KPI will revoke the quizzes' broadcasting licenses. She promised the KPI would continue to monitor TV content more intensively as the election neared.

Internet & social media

Minister questions use of fast Internet

Jakarta Post - February 1, 2014

Jakarta – Indonesia's netizens have rebuked Communications and Information Minister Tifatul Sembiring for asking them what they would do with a fast Internet connection, in the wake of a global report that said the country's Internet was the second slowest in the world.

"Dear tweeps, if we have a faster Internet connection speed, then what are we going to use it for?" he asked via his Twitter handle @tifsembiring on Thursday.

The minister's question drew anger and insults from Indonesian Twitter users who viewed him as ignorant for not knowing the benefits of having a quick Internet connection.

Twitter user @Hestipanda responded to Tifatul's message: "[To] send HD [High Definition] videos to [my] client overseas, [we have] deadlines. The only thing that can help us is Internet with a fast upload speed. Help us," she said.

Tifatul responded by giving a series of reasons why most Indonesians had to be content with a slow Internet connection, attributing the problem to the exponential growth of Indonesian Internet users.

Environment & natural disasters

Flooding, landslides cause ongoing death and destruction

Jakarta Post - February 6, 2014

Ainur Rohmah and Suherdjoko, Semarang – Floods and landslides in most parts of Central Java have caused dozens of casualties, damaged hundreds of kilometers of roads and destroyed thousands of hectares of crops.

The Central Java Disaster Mitigation Agency (BNPB) recorded 20 fatalities due to flooding and landslides as of Feb. 4. Eighteen of the deaths were a result of landslides and the two others died in floods.

Central Java BNPB acting head Sarwa Pramana specified that 12 people were killed in a landslide in Kudus, four in Kebumen, and one each in Jepara and in Semarang. The two flood-related deaths were in Pekalongan and Purworejo.

Sarwa called on residents living on hillsides and river banks to remain on the alert. As of February this year a total of 53 flooding incidents had taken place in Central Java.

Incessant rains over the past three weeks in the northern coast of the province have caused severe damage to 130 kilometers of road.

Meanwhile, President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono inspected the progress of road repairs in Pekalongan on Tuesday.

According to Deputy Minister of Public Works Hermanto Dardak, the total length of damaged roads in coastal areas of northern Java amounts to 410 km. "As many as 30 percent, or 130 kilometers, has been damaged," he said.

Head of technical development at state-owned highway company Bina Marga's Central Java office Hanung Triyono said the losses incurred from the disasters in the province had reached Rp 466 billion (US$38 million).

Bina Marga reported that as many as 158 stretches of national and provincial roads in the province were damaged due to floods and high rainfall.

Based on data derived from the National Road Supervision and Planning Agency, the length of damaged road surface on the north coast highway, the Pantura, amounted to 167 kilometers of the total 495 kilometers, or 34 percent, as of Jan. 27.

Damaged roads along the southern coast of Central Java, including the southern highway, amounted to 94 kilometers of the total 981 kilometers.

Hanung said many of the damaged roads were found in a number of points in Central Java, such as in Semarang and Cilacap. "We can not completely repair all the roads, but have carried out repairs based on priority, such as the roads in Blora, Rembang, Purwodadi and Semarang," said Hanung.

More permanent repairs would be carried out in March, he said, adding that the repairs would cost Rp 111 billion.

Floods also engulfed railway tracks along the northern coastal areas, forcing state railway company PT KAI divert trains from Jakarta to the southern track.

"The trains from Jakarta have arrived an hour late on average since the route was diverted to the southern line," PT KAI's Purwokerto's spokesman Surono said.

Meanwhile, floods have also caused the failure of at least 13,000 hectares of rice crops. Central Java acting provincial secretary Sri Puryono said crop failures had occurred in 10 regencies and municipalities.

"The total area of rice fields in the 10 regencies and municipalities engulfed by floods is 44,000 hectares, 13,000 hectares of which are subject to harvest failure," said Puryono.

The areas of swamped rice fields were in Kudus, Pati, Jepara, Demak, Pekalongan and Kendal regencies. Puryono added that the Agriculture Ministry would provide rice seedlings to help farmers whose rice fields were inundated by floods.

Schoolchildren among 14 killed by Mount Sinabung eruption

Agence France Presse - February 2, 2014

Karo, North Sumatra – Fourteen people, including four schoolchildren, were killed on Saturday after they were engulfed in scorching ash clouds spat out by Indonesia's Mount Sinabung in its biggest eruption in recent days, officials said.

Dark, searing clouds rolling down the mountain left apocalyptic scenes of ash-covered bodies scattered by a roadside in Sukameriah village, just 2.7 kilometers from the volcano's crater, an AFP witness who helped with the evacuation said.

Officials fear there could be more fatalities from Saturday's eruptions, but due to the high potential of lethal heat clouds spewing from the mountain, a search and rescue mission has been grounded, officials said.

"We suspect there are more victims but we cannot recover them because the victims are in the path of the hot [ash] clouds," said Sutopo Purwo Nugroho, the spokesman for the National Disaster Management Agency (BNPB).

All 14 bodies have been identified. Four of them were high school students on a sightseeing trip to the volcano on the western island of Sumatra, he added.

"The bodies were in a state where, even though their skin did not peel, their faces were swollen and the tongues were sticking out," an AFP reporter on the ground said.

Three other people – a father and his son who wanted to pay respects at the graves of their relatives, and a man who came to the village to check his long-abandoned house – were also trapped and injured by the deadly clouds, Karo district official Johnson Tarigan told AFP. He said the three were in the intensive care unit of a local hospital.

Thirty thousand people have been evacuated from the area since the volcano started erupting in September. But some residents had returned home on Friday following advise from the Center for Volcanology and Geological Hazard Mitigation that houses outside the five-kilometer radius from the mountain were safe.

The volcano erupted again on Saturday morning, sending hot rocks and ash up 2,000 meters into the air, blanketing the surrounding countryside with grey dust, said volcanologist Kristianto.

Sukameriah village is located in the red zone, where human activities are strictly banned, but locals often trespassed the restricted area to check on their houses and belongings as well as their crops, officials said. Nugroho said the evacuation will resume on Sunday.

Mount Sinabung is one of 129 active volcanoes in Indonesia that straddle major tectonic fault lines, known as the Pacific Ring of Fire. It had been quiet for around 400 years until it rumbled back to life in 2010, and again in September last year.

In August 2013, five people were killed and hundreds evacuated when a volcano on a small island in East Nusa Tenggara erupted. The country's most active volcano, Mount Merapi in central Java, killed more than 350 people in a series of eruptions in 2010.

Health & education

Elderly patient's 'disposal' by hospital elicits condemnation

Jakarta Globe - February 5, 2014

Alina Musta'idah, Jakarta – A legislator has demanded the overhaul of a city-run hospital in Bandarlampung, Lampung province, in the wake of the death of an elderly patient after he was taken away by ambulance and dumped by the side of the road.

Poempida Hidayatullah, a member of the House of Representatives from the Golkar Party, said on Tuesday that the alleged incident on Jan. 21 warranted a complete shakeup of the management at A Dadi Tjokrodipo General Hospital.

"I urge the police to immediately investigate this case, to look into whether the patient was abandoned as part of the hospital staff's attempt to lighten their work load," he said in Jakarta.

He also demanded that all staff found to have been involved in the incident face criminal charges in addition to any administrative sanctions meted out by the hospital, saying that what they did was tantamount to murder.

The hospital has come into the national spotlight after reports that staff ordered the "disposal" of a 64-year-old man, Suparman, by having him driven away in an ambulance and dumped by the side of the road. He died shortly after the incident. It remains unclear what he had been hospitalized for or what he died from. He was identified as an indigent, with no known family.

Bandarlampung Mayor Herman H.N. said on Monday as quoted by Tribunnews.com that the hospital had fired two officials – general affairs chief Heriyansyah and Mahendri, the head of the E2 ward where Suparman had been admitted – for allegedly ordering the dumping.

Police said on Monday that they had named six people as suspects in the case, but they did not include the two members of staff. Instead, police have charged the ambulance drive, a nurse, two janitors, an office messenger and a parking assistant for complicity in the act, according to the BBC.

"They claim they were only following orders, but we're still looking into the statement from the hospital," Brig. Gen. Heru Winarko, the Lampung Police chief, said as wuoted by the BBC.

Heru added that witnesses had claimed to see the suspects carrying Suparman out of the ambulance and placing him inside an empty roadside stall that was normally used by a durian vendor.

Poempida, who serves on the House oversight commission for health affairs, called on the Health Ministry and other authorities to be more stringent about overseeing the provision of health care.

Refugees & asylum seekers

Website reports asylum seekers saying they were turned back by Australians

The Guardian (Australia) - February 6, 2014

Helen Davidson – Reports are coming out of Indonesia of a boat arriving at a West Java beach carrying asylum seekers who say they were transferred from their vessel into a lifeboat and turned back to Indonesian waters by Australian authorities.

Indonesian website Kompas on Thursday reported a boat carrying asylum seekers arrived on Pangandaran beach, on the southern coast of West Java on Wednesday night. Passengers said they had been intercepted by Australian authorities, loaded into another enclosed boat and turned back towards Indonesian waters. One passenger said they were at sea for around 10 days.

Pikiran Rakyat reported 34 passengers from Iran, Bangladesh, Nepal and Pakistan were on board, and two Indonesian crew were being pursued by authorities. The passengers were reportedly in the custody of Indonesian authorities, but conflicting reports suggested there might be more passengers not yet detained.

Among the Iranian group was a pregnant woman and a number of children, Pikiran Rakyat reported. The same publication also claimed the vessel was an orange lifeboat, similar to one which arrived on Java last week and was thought to be one of 11 reportedly purchased by the Australian government for use in turnback operations.

At least five turnback operations are thought to have been conducted since December. The office of the Australian immigration minister, Scott Morrison, did not respond to requests for comment.

Investigation: 'burned hands' on the high seas

Sydney Morning Herald - February 6, 2014

Michael Bachelard – For a man whose words have whipped up a political and media storm in Australia, Yousif Ibrahim Fasher has been remarkably untroubled by visits from journalists. Or, for that matter, authorities.

It was Fasher who alleged a month ago that three asylum seekers had their hands deliberately burned by the Australian navy during its second operation to tow back an asylum vessel to Indonesia in January.

But since then, as the storm raged on, he was left largely alone. This week, in the Tanjung Pinang immigration detention centre on a little island off the coast of Sumatra, that changed. Fairfax Media conducted the first extended face-to-face interview with Fasher, who says he was an eyewitness to the incident, and he told his story in unprecedented detail.

Details aside, though, his account has been consistent from the first. He says he has no doubt that what he saw at close quarters on about January 3 was three people's hands being deliberately held to a hot exhaust pipe by Australian naval personnel to punish them for protesting, and to deter others from doing one simple thing: going to the toilet too often.

They are allegations which, when given credence and air time by the ABC, encouraged the Abbott government and Rupert Murdoch's News Corp to open a culture war with the national broadcaster, to review its funding and question its reach into Asia. The Australian navy and government robustly denied Fasher's allegations and has repeatedly done so since.

"Who do you believe?" Prime Minister Tony Abbott asked last month. "Do you believe Australian naval personnel or do you believe people who were attempting to break Australian law? I trust Australia's naval personnel."

Navy Admiral Ray Griggs tweeted on January 22: "Based on everything I know there is no basis to these allegations – none."

Abbott dismissed the allegations again on Thursday night, saying there was no need for further investigation. He told Fairfax Media: "I just think that the allegations in question are so obviously self-serving from the point-of-view of the person making them, and they are so patently out of character with the Australian military, that, in the absence of some serious corroboration, it's very hard to take them seriously."

The Minister for Immigration and Border Protection, Scott Morrison, also dismissed the allegations on Thursday without responding specifically to a detailed list of written questions about the alleged "burned hands" incident. He said Navy and Customs personnel had clear guidelines and would "only use force where necessary and appropriate to deal with threatening and non-compliant behaviour, as appropriate".

"The government does not give credibility to malicious and unfounded slurs being made against our navy personnel and rejects outright any allegations of unprofessional conduct by our people serving in Operation Sovereign Borders. If media outlets wish to give credibility by publishing such unsubstantiated claims, that is a matter for them," Morrison said.

Fasher, though, says he has no motive to lie. Quite the reverse; he believes telling his story may harm his chances of being granted permanent refuge in Australia. He is willing to talk to Australian authorities, but none so far has sought to ask him questions.

He has also gone further: he has reiterated other allegations, also made early in his return to Indonesia, but which, out of deference to navy denials, the Australian media has not until now reported.

On Fasher's account, the naval sailors who rotated onto and off the wooden fishing vessel carrying 45 people restricted the passengers' access to the toilet from the first day of the operation, January 1. Women were allowed to go once per day, at night time, and the men during the day.

A low corridor ran from the cabin where most of the passengers stayed, past the engine room to the rear of the boat where the toilet was located. Fasher demonstrated how he had to stoop to walk down this corridor. Four naval personnel guarded its rear entrance and two guards stationed in the main cabin restricted entry to it from that end.

Across the narrow corridor, low to the ground, were three exhaust pipes, running fumes from the engines out the side of the boat to the open air. Passengers had to step over them to get to the toilet. Only one engine was working – the navy fixed it on the third day of the tow-back – so only one exhaust pipe was hot, Fasher said.

On that same day, a group of four men were protesting against the toilet strictures. Fasher was the navy's go-to man for translation, and was in the main cabin interpreting.

As the argument heated up, he says the four asylum seekers forced their way past the two guards in the main cabin to try to get to the toilet. Those guards followed them in, and the guards at the other end also entered the corridor to stop them. There was an altercation, which Fasher said he was watching from outside.

During the turmoil he says a young man, Bowby Nooris, the first into the corridor, was sprayed in the eyes with capsicum spray, stumbled and blindly grabbed at the hot pipe.

This is consistent with Nooris's injuries, and what he has subsequently told both the ABC and The Australian about how they were incurred. It's the basis of the conclusion by Media Watch that: "It appears that the burns occurred in a scuffle with the navy and were not deliberately inflicted by navy personnel".

But Fasher insists that, after Nooris fell, naval personnel – he does not know their names – grabbed the wrists of three other men and forced their hands onto the hot pipe, one after the other. He demonstrates how he says it was done.

"I saw it with my eyes because I was translating... They punished three of them, three of them, as a punishment, so they would never want to go to the toilet again," Fasher said.

Afterwards, he says, a man in navy uniform called him over. "They said, 'Yousif, translate for the people. Say to anyone: If you want to go to the toilet again, we will burn his hands. So, tell them.' So I translate for them."

Apart from those three and Nooris, Fasher says a fifth person, his own wife, suffered burns. She fell on the pipe after being pushed by a member of a naval boarding party and was burned on her arm.

Abdullah Ahmed, from Eritrea was on the same boat. He admitted he had not seen the incident because he was on the top deck, but the hand-burning story had immediately spread among the passengers. "I saw people with burned hands... They said, 'Don't go to the toilet, it's punishment... from the navy'," Ahmed said.

Fasher and Ahmed allege that, for the remaining days of the journey, the navy refused medical treatment for the burns, telling people to lie down and drink water.

Missing from the story so far is testimony from the three men whose hands were allegedly deliberately burned. Two of them, Nour and Moustafa, refused multiple requests to speak of their experiences. Fasher says they are afraid. "They're afraid that if they say the truth, maybe Australia will not accept them, maybe they will not be accepted through the UN."

The third, Somalian Mohammad Ar, did finally agreed to an interview with Fairfax Media at the Kupang hotel where he was still being held late last week. But though we travelled from one end of the Indonesian archipelago to the other to take up his offer, Indonesian immigration officials prevented that interview from taking place inside the hotel because it was "against regulations". An English-speaking intermediary, Faisal Hussein, said Ar was too scared of reprisals from heavy-handed officials to come outside the hotel to speak.

Allegations of five people burned – three deliberately and two as a result of rough treatment – remains short of the seven claimed in the ABC reports, and which was one of the elements that prompted Media Watch to accuse it of over-reach. The ABC has issued a statement admitting its wording could have been "more precise".

But, Fasher says he witnessed three people who have had pain deliberately inflicted on them by Australian personnel. If it seems unlikely or bizarre that naval personnel would deliberately restrict access to the toilet on a vessel under their control, it's not the first time the allegation has been made.

In 2003, an Afghan asylum seeker, Abbas Ali Changizi alleged that, on a 2001 navy interception, "passing water" was strictly controlled by sailors aboard his boat, and asylum seekers asking to do so were mistreated. Abbas made a police statement at the time, and his claims were investigated. They were later dismissed as unsubstantiated.

Fasher is aware that his story has been heavily disputed in Australia, but says he has no motive to lie. "Why people would burn their hands by themselves?... If [it was only] one person you could say an accident, but five people?" He also says that they had survived on that boat with its inconvenient exhaust outlet design for 10 days without coming to grief.

Two News Corp outlets made claims that the hands were burned during attempts to sabotage the engine. A January 22 report on the Daily Telegraph website cited no source, but stated: "Far from burning the hands of asylum seekers, Australian Navy sailors actually provided first aid to asylum seekers whose hands were burned as they attempted to sabotage their own boat". On January 24, The Australian cited Australia Defence Association executive director Neil James saying that when the navy arrived at the scene the engine was already cold.

Fashar says if the sabotage claims were true the hands would have been burned before the navy first found the vessel on January 1. The burns did not appear until January 3, he says.

Fasher also alleged other forms of mistreatment on board the boat. Some of the navy personnel, though by no means all, had also been rude and insulting, he said.

"They said, 'F – k you... You choose to come from your country, we don't ask you to come'. "To the black Africans one said, 'Oh, you're a monkey from Africa'." Fasher has also made two other specific allegations.

From early in January he has told media organisations, including Fairfax Media, about four young men whom he says went overboard from their wooden vessel in the hours before the navy found their boat off Darwin. He claims naval crews were told of the tragedy, but did not appear to make any attempt to search for the missing men.

Fasher, backed by Ahmed, says the four – two Somalians, one Sudanese and one from Yemen and all relatives of other passengers – had fallen overboard in heavy weather when the boat was only 37km from Darwin. It was the only thing, Fasher says, that prompted them to divert their course to a nearby island and call authorities.

"Why would we land down on the island? [Otherwise] we would have continued because we had fuel, we had one engine working and it was only 37km to Darwin. Why did we call people [for help]? Because... we lost people."

However, Fasher said the navy showed little sign of searching for the men missing, one of whom was his cousin, Usman Ali Fasher, 23, or their bodies. The naval first responders who dealt with the group told them they had to leave the island because crocodiles made it dangerous, and that their boat was safer, Fasher said.

"They said they were going to look for [the missing men] and when we kept asking questions, they said, we'll never go anywhere until we have found your friends and brothers." Fasher has since heard no news of the missing men, including his cousin. He now presumes them drowned.

The minister, Morrison, said Thursday the government was aware "of claims that four people may have fallen overboard from a suspected illegal entry vessel inside Australian waters" on Tuesday January 7, 2014.

"These claims were rigorously assessed and acted on at the time they were made, and I am confident that they were not true. It is important to note that the claimed incident occurred well before the suspected illegal entry vessel had been intercepted by Australian authorities. For operational security reasons, the government will not go into further detail on this matter," Morrison said.

The second previously unreported allegation concerns the apparently imminent finding by the Australian navy that its ships, in the words of Abbott, fumbled their way into Indonesian waters as a test cricketer might drop a catch.

Fasher and Ahmed say that for the last two nights of his tow-back, January 4 and 5, the two Australian navy vessels turned off their lights. An Australian navy source has said this would never happen and is against the law of the sea.

However, the account is consistent with that of another asylum seeker, Abdirashid Mohamed, who was quoted in the Indonesian press on January 8 – well before the Australian government admitted to border incursions – saying the lights on the ships were extinguished and the asylum boat returned very close to shore. That report suggested the reason was to avoid detection by the Indonesian navy.

Fasher said the asylum seekers had their own GPS device which showed their position after being released by the naval ships as 14 km (7.5 nautical miles) off the shore of Rote Island – well within the 12 nautical mile Indonesian nautical limits territory.

Anwar Salih, a passenger on the first boat to be turned back by Australia – on December 19, 2013 – told Fairfax Media that his boat also had sailed very close to shore with lights of the accompanying naval vessels extinguished. After the navy ships left them, he said they were only one hour's sailing from shore – perhaps 5 km to 7 km.

Fasher and Salih could not say why the lights were put out. When they asked for an explanation from the naval personnel, they were not given one.

Asked if it were possible the ship's captains had deliberately gone closer to Rote Island to try to ensure the safety of the people they were putting back, Customs and Border Protection referred Fairfax Media to Minister Morrison's January 17 press conference in which he apologised for "inadvertent incursions" into Indonesia.

Law of the sea expert, Professor Don Rothwell said captains could arguably cite "right of assistance" provisions to enter another country's territorial waters to make the dangerous business of turning back boats safer. However, a navy source said this would not happen, and that captains' orders were "quite emphatic" that they should not do so for any reason.

Fasher has given a statement to the Indonesian police, but that investigation stalled because the alleged offences happened outside Indonesian territorial waters. The police passed their queries to the United Nations. A UN spokeswoman recently told the ABC they were "asking additional questions to corroborate the facts", but it did not amount to an investigation. They hoped Australian authorities "will conduct a swift investigation". The Federal government has said it is willing to provide documents and videos to refute the accusations.

And for his part, Fasher says nobody in authority in Australia has yet asked him to tell them what he saw.

Graft & corruption

Many fear House seeks to defang KPK with bill

Jakarta Post - February 7, 2014

Ina Parlina and Haeril Halim, Jakarta – The Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK) on Thursday urged the House of Representatives to drop its plan to amend the Code of Criminal Procedures (KUHAP), saying it would weaken the country's anti-corruption campaign.

In the KUHAP amendment under deliberation, the House planned to remove the right of law enforcement agencies to perform preliminary investigations into a case.

The draft amendment also creates a new entity called the commissioner judge, which would independently determine whether a law enforcement agency could proceed with an investigation, detain suspects, search and seize evidence or wiretap phone conversations.

"Rescinding the KPK's right to conduct preliminary investigations is like deliberately and systematically removing the KPK's authority to go after wrongdoing," KPK deputy chairman Bambang Widjojanto said on Thursday. "Such a move is against the spirit of reform and is detrimental to corruption eradication."

The same concern was raised by legal activists last year when the Law and Human Rights Ministry proposed the measure to the House of Representatives.

Bambang also expressed concern about the timing for deliberation the bill, given that the House only had less then three months before the legislative election. The official campaign period for the April 9 legislative election began in January, and the House is expected to recess next month.

"The time is too short to discuss such complex legal matters. It is unlikely that the deliberations will allow for public participation. The KPK has also not been invited to the deliberations," Bambang said.

Earlier, the Indonesia Corruption Watch (ICW), along with several other NGOs, also expressed concerns on the draft, which they deemed was a deliberate move to weaken the KPK. "Without having the authority to carry out its own investigations, the KPK will be crippled," ICW's Tama S. Langkun said.

Tama said lawmakers were unlikely to produce quality legislation since it was campaign season. "The deliberation should take a lot of time, but lawmakers are now turning their attention to how to win again in the legislative election."

The House declined to take the blame for the poor timing of the amendment's deliberation. Ahmad Yani, a lawmaker from the United Development Party (PPP), said it was easy for the anti-graft body "to launch an attack on the House since the KPK is anti-party and anti-House. "What they forget is that the proposed amendment comes from the government," he said.

Prosperous Justice Party (PKS) lawmaker Al Muzzammil Yusuf said the draft was wider in scope. "Don't assume this is just about the KPK. We want to improve the operations of the police and prosecutors,"

Law and Human Rights Minister Amir Syamsuddin said he would be "open for a discussion" with the KPK, but that there was little he could do as the amendment's "deliberation had begun in the House".

Deputy Law and Human Rights Minister Denny Indrayana said the draft would not weaken the KPK. "The government's stance is that if the draft leads to attempts to hinder the KPK, yes, we [the government] will withdraw it," he said.

Denny also said that the KPK should not be worried about the planned amendment as the lex specialis anti-corruption law would override the general law. "So, the problem now is not about the substance of the draft but its process," he said.

Extortion by lawmakers exposed

Jakarta Post - February 5, 2014

Haeril Halim, Jakarta – A witness in the graft trial of former Upstream Oil and Gas Regulatory Special Task Force (SKKMigas) chairman Rudi Rubiandini has further exposed the endemic corruption involving members of the House of Representatives in the country's energy sector.

Former SKKMigas deputy for business affairs Gerhard Marteen Rumeser testified at the Jakarta Corruption Court on Tuesday that Rudi once told him that the agency "owed" the House US$1 million and that Rudi had sought his help in obtaining $500,000 to pay the "debt".

Gerhard said Raden Priyono, who then headed BPMigas, had promised the lawmakers to give them the money. BPMigas was disbanded by the Constitutional Court in November 2012 and later replaced by SKKMigas.

"Pak Rudi asked me to find ways to look for money to pay the 'debt' after he had a meeting with a lawmaker who reminded him to pay it. However, Pak Rudi said it did not have to be $1 million, but just $500,000," Gerhard said.

He added that he did not know who the lawmaker was or whether Rudi was able to collect the money and give it to the House.

He did say, however, that representatives of the House's budget committee often contacted Rudi and that he was once asked to prepare a "package" for them.

Gerhard's testimony confirmed allegations that systemic corruption in the energy sector had occurred long before SKKMigas was established to replace BPMigas. Previously, state-run oil firm PT Pertamina president director Karen Agustiawan claimed she often faced extortion from House members.

In the Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK) case dossier on Rudi, a copy of which was obtained by The Jakarta Post, Karen said several officials, including Rudi and Energy and Mineral Resources Minister Jero Wacik, asked her for money to pay off lawmakers so they would approve the disbursement of the ministry's state budget allocation.

Karen claimed that Rudi once phoned her to say Jero and he had agreed that SKKMigas would provide $150,000 to help grease the House's deliberations on the ministry's budget, while another $150,000 would be provided by Pertamina, according to the dossier.

The money was referred to by Jero – a senior Democratic Party politician – as "holiday bonuses". The ruling party declined to comment on the allegations. Two other PD politicians – Sutan Bhatoegana and Tri Yulianto – have also been implicated in Rudi's case.

Rudi claimed he was pressed by House Commission VII overseeing natural resources to pay out Idul Fitri holiday bonuses in 2013. Rudi said he had given $200,000 to Tri, reportedly on the instruction of Sutan.

In Tuesday's trial, Gerhard testified that Sutan – given his position as head of the House Commission VII – had instructed Rudi to favor his company, PT Timas Suplindo, in the tender of an offshore construction project held by SKKMigas.

"I received a text message from Pak Rudi that read: 'From SB [Sutan Bhatoegana]: I heard that the tender is now open. The price that PT Timas offered is lower than [PT] Saipem's price [another company bidding on the tender], thus, the company that offers the lowest price should be the winner'."

Gerhard said he named PT Timas the winner of the tender after receiving instruction from Rudi through text message, although he received complaints from Deni Karmaina, a backer of PT Saipem.

Gerhard said that Deni, who is reportedly a close friend of President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono's youngest son, Edhie Baskoro, submitted documents to him that revealed the ineligibility of PT Timas to bid on the tender. Sutan refused to comment on Gerhard's claims, saying he would let the KPK do its job.

In big antigraft year, not enough big scalps: ICW

Jakarta Globe - February 3, 2014

SP/Novianti Setuningsih, Jakarta – Antigraft investigators appeared to have a bumper 2013, arresting the country's top judge, a serving governor and the former sports minister, among other high-profile targets.

But for activists at Indonesia Corruption Watch, these big-league suspects were the exception rather than the rule, with most of graft-related arrests in the course of the past year being made against low- and mid-ranking officials.

Agus Sunaryanto, ICW's deputy coordinator, said on Sunday that the common perception that law enforcement agencies such as the Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK), the Attorney General's Office and the National Police took a particularly hard line on corruption last year was flawed.

"The people who were arrested for corruption were predominantly the small fry," he said. He said the "vast majority" of the 1,271 people arrested or charged with corruption in 2013 fell into this category, but did not give a specific figure.

Some 557 civil servants were busted for graft during this period, along with 108 regional agency chiefs and 85 officials from government-owned enterprises, according to ICW research.

There were also 274 graft suspects named from the private sector, but tellingly, said Agus, only 62 from regional legislatures or the House of Representatives.

Tama Satrya Langkun, the head of ICW's investigative division, said this still represented an increase from the 38 legislators arrested and charged in 2012, but remained far too low given the pervasive extent of corruption at this level.

"Every year we see regional officials and government ministry officials being named corruption suspects. It's always these middle- and low-ranking officials," he said.

'Massive year'

The caliber of the suspects notwithstanding, however, Tama acknowledged that law enforcement, in particular the KPK, had experienced a strong year in terms of tackling corruption.

He said there were 560 cases under investigation last year, a significant rise from the 401 cases in 2012 and 436 in 2011. The total number of suspects was also up, compared to 877 in 2012 and 1,053 in 2011.

"The trend in fighting corruption over the past three years has been positive in terms of the number of cases being handled and suspects being named," Tama said.

He added that the combined losses incurred by the state as a result of corruption unveiled in 2013 was much larger than the previous year, although the latter figure was inflated by the Rp 6.7 trillion ($549 million) Bank Century bailout scandal, which occurred in 2008 but in which the KPK only named its first suspects in 2012.

"The state losses in 2013 amounted to Rp 7.3 trillion. The total in 2012 was higher, at Rp 10.4 trillion, but only because we counted the Bank Century case that year," he said. That effectively made 2013 a "massive year" in terms of fighting graft, Tama added.

Big scalps

Among the major graft suspects named last year was Akil Mochtar, at the time the chief justice of the widely respected Constitutional Court.

Akil was arrested in October for allegedly taking bribes to rule in favor of certain candidates in at least two regional election disputes being heard by the court. The KPK is investigating how many other cases he may have been involved in.

Also arrested in the same case was Ratu Atut Chosiyah, the widely lampooned governor of Banten, who was taken into the KPK's custody in December for allegedly arranging a bribe for Akil in connection with the election for district head in Lebak, Banten.

The governor and her family have long been accused of massive corruption through their virtual chokehold on seats of power throughout Banten, with Lebak one of the only districts where the family did not have one of its members or a crony in a position of authority.

Another major scalp claimed by the KPK in 2013 was that of Andi Mallarangeng, the former sports minister, who was arrested in October after having been named a suspect in December 2012 in connection with the Rp 2.5 trillion project to construct the Hambalang sports center in Bogor.

Andi's arrest was followed last month by that of Anas Urbaningrum, the former Democratic Party chairman, who is accused of having taken Rp 100 billion in kickbacks to help rig the awarding of the contract during his time as a legislator.

Going local

Agus said one of the key findings made by ICW last year was the discovery of the high number of graft cases in the regions, accounting for 98 percent of the 267 cases under investigation in the second half of 2013.

He said the provinces of North Sumatra and East Java had the highest number of cases, and called the decentralization of corruption to local governments a "national emergency," noting that 35 regional heads, including Ratu Atut, were named suspects during that time.

"Data from the Home Affairs Ministry show that a total of 390 regional heads have been charged in criminal cases since regional autonomy was introduced" in 2001, Agus said.

He added that while the general increase in the number of suspects, cases and confirmed losses indicated that law enforcement agencies were working harder to fight corruption, there was also an indication that the problem of graft was growing even more untenable, particularly at the local level, where both media scrutiny and the KPK's reach were limited.

He said relatively light prison sentences were partly to blame for not serving as much of a deterrent effect, but noted that the Jakarta Anti- Corruption Court had been handing out longer sentences since last year, while the Supreme Court was also tending to give graft convicts longer sentences upon appeal.

Indonesia consistently ranks among the counties with the highest perceptions of corruption, according to Transparency International's annual Corruption Perceptions Index.

In the 2013 index, Indonesia was ranked 114th out of 170 countries surveyed. Although it was a rise of four places from the previous year, in reality, the TI report found little had changed in Indonesia. Its score, at 32, remained the same as in 2012, with the rise having more to do with the situation in other countries deteriorating.

Freedom of religion & worship

Indonesia's growing religious intolerance has to be addressed

The Guardian (Australia) - February 5, 2014

Elaine Pearson – Exactly three years ago, on 6 February 2011, some 1,500 Islamist militants stormed the Ahmadiyah community in Cikeusik village in western Java.

In this exceptionally brutal assault, which was captured on video, the attackers beat three Ahmadiyah men to death and seriously injured five others. Gruesome footage of the violence circulated widely on the internet, shocking Indonesians and the world. Police ultimately used the video evidence to identify several perpetrators, 12 of whom were convicted but given lenient sentences from three to six months' imprisonment.

Neighbouring governments like Australia have good reason for concern about the Indonesian government's apparently inability or unwillingness to protect the Ahmadiyah, a Muslim sect, and other religious minorities from bigoted thugs who act with apparent impunity.

Two weeks ago, a survivor of that horrific attack, Acmad Masihuddin, accompanied me to visit several Ahmadiyah communities in the hills outside Jakarta. Masihuddin told me how that fateful day he tried to run away. Members of the mob caught him and dragged him back, stripping him to his underwear, and beat him with a hoe and machete, until a police officer pronounced him dead and put him in the back of a police van – saving his life.

Masihuddin, whose injuries required two years of treatment, still suffers from headaches and lost partial sight in one of his eyes. Now he works for one of Indonesia's leading human rights groups, Kontras, to support victims of religious violence. Masihuddin told me, "I am working for Kontras, because I want to stop this from happening again."

Three years after what should have been Indonesia's wake up call to address religious violence, the Ahmadiyah and the country's other religious minorities are under threat. Across Indonesia, there are multiplying incidents of harassment, threats and violence against religious minorities including several Christian groups, Shia and the Ahmadiyah. These groups have become targets of Islamist militant groups who label most non-Muslims as "infidels," and Muslims who do not adhere to Sunni orthodoxy as "blasphemers." Even Indonesia's atheists live in fear of such groups.

Islamist militants have increasingly and often violently attacked Ahmadiyah since 2005 when Indonesia's Ulama council, the MUI (Majelis Ulama Indonesia), declared a fatwa, or religious edict, ruling that the Ahmadiyah community deviated from Qur'anic teachings. In 2008, the government passed a nationwide anti-Ahmadiyah decree than bans the Ahmadiyah from proselytising their faith. The government justified this decree on the basis of reducing violence and promoting religious harmony. Instead, the number of attacks has steadily risen and more than 30 towns, regencies and provinces across Indonesia have followed suit, with some outright banning the Ahmadiyah as West Java province has.

I met with representatives of five Ahmadiyah communities in Sukadana, West Java, who described almost daily intimidation, harassment and discrimination, resulting in the closure of three Ahmadiyah mosques by local officials. Ulamas have preached sermons of hate and intolerance over loudspeakers and in some cases, started campaigns to avoid Ahmadiyah-owned businesses. "I get jittery every time I hear the ulamas speaking over the loudspeaker," an Ahmadiyah woman told me.

Some Ahmadiyah have found it difficult to find jobs. Several men described bureaucratic hurdles when dealing with local officials or requesting new identification documents or building permits. Some Ahmadiyah teachers have been pressured to convert to Sunni Islam or transferred to remote schools when they resisted. Ahmadiyah children have also been bullied by classmates and teachers have pressured them to denounce their "heretical" religious views. Even hospitals are unwilling to accept Ahmadiyah blood, with one woman telling me, "We try to donate blood and we are refused, they say we don't want Ahmadiyah blood. Only if it's an emergency, then they come here and ask us."

This sweeping ostracization of the Ahmadiyah is more insidious than the brutal violence of the Cikeusik attack, and just as dangerous.

Islamists have been emboldened by the success in repressing the Ahmadiyah and are also turning their attention to other minority groups, like the Shia, Bahai and Christians. A 2006 decree that requires religious groups to get permission from a significant number of community members before building a house of worship has been used to shut down not only around 30 Ahmadiyah mosques, but more than 500 Christian churches and several Buddhist temples as well.

Why should Australians care?

A neighbouring country that fails to act decisively in the face of religious violence and facilitates intolerance of other faiths in violation of Indonesia's own Constitution risks destabilising the region. While Indonesia has done reasonably well in curbing terrorism, its enabling attitude towards intolerant Islamists may create threats which might spill over Indonesia's borders. Australia does not want to see Indonesia follow the path of Pakistan, where a failure of accountability for violence against religious minorities has led to steady increases in violence against Ahmadiyah, Shia, and Christians."

To curb this trend of intolerance, the Indonesian government needs to act decisively. It can start by revoking discriminatory decrees as well as thoroughly investigating and punishing acts of religious violence. So far, president Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono has claimed he has "no tolerance" for religious violence, yet has he repeatedly failed to back up that promise with action. Australia and other key governments have leverage and should keep the pressure on Yudhoyono to address religious violence.

Land & agrarian conflicts

Farmers demand payment from resort project

Jakarta Post - February 6, 2014

Mataram – At least 120 farmers from three villages in Central Lombok regency staged a rally in front of the West Nusa Tenggara gubernatorial office on Wednesday, demanding payment for land that will be used for the Mandalika integrated resort.

The demonstration was triggered by activities on the site of the resort, one of the projects under The Acceleration and Expansion of Indonesian Economic Development (MP3EI) managed by state-run PT Bali Tourism Development Corporate (BTDC).

"We do not reject the project, but please complete the payment for our land," one of the farmers, Sahabuddin of Sengkol said.

Sahabuddin claimed that nine hectares of his land were acquired for the project, but had only been paid Rp.47 million for five hectares since land acquisition for the project started in 1992.

Central Lombok administration spokesman Lalu Herdan said BTDC had yet to pay for 130 of 1,250 hectares of land that would be used for the resort. "But BTDC committed to pay. We have the data. It's a matter of realization," Herdan said.

Transport & communication

All potholed roads lead to shoddy contractors: Expert

Jakarta Globe - February 4, 2014

Hayat Indriyatno, Jakarta – A road expert has joined in the chorus of criticism against the Jakarta and central governments for the poor state of roads in the capital, long stretches of which have become badly damaged or potholed as a result of the recent rains.

Soegeng Purnomo, an expert on road construction at the nongovernmental Indonesian Transportation Society, or MTI, said on Tuesday that although plans to build and expand the road network were laudable, the implementation was "woeful."

"The quality of the roads in Jakarta are simply woeful. And to make matters worse, the process of fixing them is just as bad," Soegeng said.

He said there were standards in place that needed to be followed for repairing roads with potholes, but that contractors almost invariably failed to comply with those guidelines.

For one thing, he went on, the contractors tended to just fill in any potholes they found with hot-mix asphalt, without even making sure that the mixture was poured at the correct temperature of 180 degrees Celsius.

"So you have a case where the mix of materials in the hot-mix isn't even up to standard, and then it's being poured at a much lower temperature than required, usually less than 100 degrees Celsius," Soegeng said. "So obviously you end up with a stretch of road that will easily become potholed again."

He said that many stretches of road, when newly built, appeared smooth. But because the contractors tended to skimp on the quality of the materials used and on the heating required for the asphalt, the blacktop was not as compact as it needed to be.

Cavities in the asphalt then trapped water, which, combined with the repeated loading from motor vehicles, caused small holes to form that would eventually expand to become potholes, Soegeng said.

The Public Works Ministry and the Jakarta Public Works Office have come under mounting criticism for the rapidly growing number of damaged stretches of road as heavy rains and on-and-off flooding continue to hammer the capital.

Official data show that damage to roads in the last two weeks has increased by 133.6 percent. Some 3,903 damaged sites needed to be repaired, up from 2,234 a fortnight ago. It is likely that there are cases of road damage that have not made it into the official count.

The Jakarta administration, which last December conceded that its "zero hole" program to fix all potholed roads had failed, said it would roll out the program again this year.

Deputy Governor Basuki Tjahaja Purnama said on Monday that the city planned to layer some of the damaged roads with a quick-setting steel-reinforced concrete, which would theoretically make for a more durable surface than asphalt.

He said the repairs, to be launched immediately, would prioritize some 144,000 square meters of roadway, or 3 percent of the city's total road surface, primarily in the North Jakarta areas of Cilincing and Tanjung Priok. Roads in both areas have for years undergone a cycle of deterioration and repair, with much of the damage blamed on the heavy container traffic passing through on its way to and from Tanjung Priok Port.

Basuki said the concrete layers, with a rated setting time of just six hours, were guaranteed to last for at least five years.

He did not cite a budget for the project, but said it would work out cheaper than having to constantly rebuild and repair the roads every few months.

Basuki said the work would begin once there was one-or two-day a letup in the rain.

Jakarta Police reported at least four people died in the past month alone due to poor road conditions in the capital, including a 7-year-old boy who was run over by a truck after being thrown from his mother's motorcycle when it hit a pothole.

In 2013, a total of 19 people died as a result of the poor roads, most of them motorcyclists.

Merpati grounded as airline struggles to take off under weight of debt

Jakarta Globe - February 3, 2014

Camelia Pasandaran, Jakarta – Cash-strapped carrier Merpati Nusantara Airlines has suspended all flights in early February as falling revenue continued to push the struggling state-owned airline closer to bankruptcy.

The low-cost airline, which offers flights to underserved regions in Indonesia, announced the suspension over the weekend after it grounded all flights, leaving passengers stranded at remote airports across Indonesia and prompting a harsh warning from transportation officials. Service may resume as early as Thursday but officials were mum as to whether any Mepati flights would take off by the week's end.

"It can be resumed on Feb. 6, but it's all according to when we're ready to resume operations," corporate secretary Riswanto said. "We will analyze our ability while re-managing which routes to serve in the future."

The airline has one month to recommence operations before the Ministry of Transportation revokes its flight permits, ministry spokesman Bambang Ervan said. The airline, unable to purchase fuel on credit from state-owned energy firm Pertamina, began to scale back its operations in late January, parking all but eight planes in an effort to stave-off a larger shutdown. But the cost of refunding the tickets for cancelled flights, combined with the company's heavy debt load – Rp 6 trillion [$492 million] by recent estimates – proved too much for the sputtering carrier.

The airline will start running again as soon as it is able to get its debt under control, explained operational director Daryanto.

"Starting with the decreasing daily cash flow, plus the decreasing trust of the people and agents, is how we arrived at a point where we can't continue operational activities," Daryanto said. "Under this situation, with all due respect, our flights temporarily stopped until Feb. 5. All MZ [Merpati] route permits have been suspended until the end of February 2014."

The shutdown is the latest blow to the pioneer airline. The company has struggled to overcome years of mismanagement and corruption, losing as much as Rp 1.5 billion a week to close in the red for five straight years. The Ministry of State-Owned Enterprises has repeatedly tried to save Merpati, streamlining operations, restructuring debt and moving its headquarters all in an effort to lower costs.

Last week State-Owned Enterprises Minister Dahlan Iskan announced the sale of two Merpati subsidiaries – Merpati Maintenance Facilities (MMF) and Merpati Training Center – in a last-ditch effort to keep the airline aloft.

At the time the airline was unable to purchase fuel on credit, having twice exceeded its maximum debt limit with state-owned energy firm Pertamina. The airlines owed the company some Rp 165 billion by Jan. 29, prompting Pertamina officials to announce they would only accept cash from Merpati for future fuel shipments. The carrier began paying cash for fuel on Jan. 15, according to Pertamina. Less than two weeks later it began to ground flights.

The situation was worse for Merpati employees, who claim they haven't been paid in more than three months, according to reports in the Indonesian news portal Detik.com. Merpati union chief Sudiyarto pleaded with the government for help, arguing that the company's board of directors was unable to run the ailing airline.

"Please we're hungry, for three months we haven't gotten our salary," Sudiyarto told Detik.com. "Our directors can't solve Merpati's problems. Anyone who has interest in Merpati, please help us."

The Ministry of State-Owned Enterprises has told all Merpati employees to stay home until the airline can cut monthly paychecks again. According to the union chief, Merpati employees haven't seen a paycheck since October of last year. There is no indication that the airline will issue a paycheck anytime soon, Sudiyarto said.

Dahlan said he understood the employees' frustration. "I've met the pilots' union," he told Detik.com. "I understand that they were upset, and it's very normal."

Customers have also turned on the airline, complaining of last-minute cancellations and refund delays. Jilted passengers protested outside of a regional office in Makassar, South Sulawesi, after the company cancelled all but three flights from the provincial capital. Local representatives allegedly refused to issue refunds to passengers, according to reports in the Indonesian news portal TribunNews.com.

"She said Merpati had no money and refused to return our money," one passenger told Tribunnews.com. The company said it would transfer all passengers to competing airlines or refund the ticket price in a month's time.

"Besides transferring [passengers] to other airlines, the passengers who want a refund can get it 30 days after the flight cancellation," marketing director Irvan Harijanto said.

But much of the small airline's routes service remote airports with a limited number competing flights. Although it has 52 routes in Indonesia, servicing airports from Sinabang, Aceh, to Merauke, Papua, much of the carrier's competition is with niche airlines like Susi Air – another pioneer carrier with a marred safety record. Merpati has struggled with a less-than-sterling history – booking at least five serious accidents since 2009 – and a reportedly dodgy deal for 15 MA60s from Chinese plane maker Xian.

Merpati purchased the turboprop planes for $14.1 million in 2008 – some $3 million more than similar purchases in Philippines, Ghana and Nepal. Company officials at the time reportedly had questions about the aircraft's safety after finding cracks in one of the craft's vertical stabilizers and threatened to cancel the order. When the Chinese government responded with a threat of its own – halting a loan for a needed electricity development project – then-Trade Minister Mari Elka Pangestu flew to China to renegotiate the deal.

The resulting purchase – made possible with a 15-year loan from China Export-Import Bank at 2.5 percent interest – is under investigation by the Attorney General's Office (AGO). But after several crashes in Indonesia and abroad, including a 2011 Merpati crash in West Papua that left 25 dead, the government was forced to conduct an audit on the seemingly troubled aircraft. The government grounded all MA60s owned by Merpati in June of last year as it conducted an audit. The company once owned 15 MA60s, but it wrote off two after serious accidents. Five others were undergoing maintenance at the time of the audit.

Crashes, cancelled flights and corruption allegations have hurt consumer confidence in Merpati at a time when competition in the nation's growing aviation industry is stiff. The industry already claimed one victim – the permanently grounded Batavia Air – despite the domestic market growing some 20 percent in 2012, according to analysis by the Centre for Aviation. The domestic market doubled in four years' time, growing to become the fifth largest aviation market in the world, the report read. Much of the growth has been pushed by private firms like AirAsia and Lion Air, as well as Citilink, the low-cost arm of state-run airline Garuda Indonesia.

The central government attempted to sell-off its stake in Merpati last year with limited success. If the airline survives this recent shutdown it likely faces serious competition from both Lion Air and Sriwijaya Air in the near future. The private airlines expressed interest in ordering small, domestically built aircraft for pioneer routes in East Indonesia – putting the airlines in direct competition with Merpati. Lion Air, which runs the small-craft subsidiary Wings Air, inked a deal to purchase 100 19-passenger planes from local manufacturer Dirgantara Indonesia. The small N-219 passenger planes is the first manufactured by an Indonesian company since the N-250 took to the skies in the 1990s.

Lion Air has made a significant play for a share in one of Asia's fastest- growing aviation markets. In 2011 it booked a record $22 billion order with Boeing for 230 planes. Last year the carrier inked an even larger deal, $24 billion for 234 planes with manufacturer Airbus. Merpati is unlikely to survive without further government intervention, industry analyst Gerry Sudjatman said.

"It depends on how far the government wants to step in," Gerry said. "If Merpati wants to declare bankruptcy it will need the government's approval. But if Merpati wants to carry on, it will need fresh cash. What is happening now is Merpati is having a rough time and they don't know which way to go, especially with the new players in the market.

"Merpati won't survive if the government doesn't step in and make a firm decision about Merpati's future."

Armed forces & defense

Indonesia and the Netherlands strengthen defense cooperation

Antara News - February 6, 2014

Jakarta – The defense ministers of Indonesia and the Netherlands, Purnomo Yusgiantoro and Jeanine Hennis Plasschaert, signed an MoU to strengthen defense cooperation between the two countries in Den Haag, the Netherlands.

The defense MoU is an important step towards increasing the diplomatic ties between Indonesia and the Netherlands and indicated a strong commitment to strengthen the cooperation among the two countries, Indonesian Defense Minister Purnomo Yusgiantoro noted in a press statement, the details of which were made available to ANTARA here on Thursday.

"Based on mutual respect for each others sovereignty and territorial integrity, the principles of equality, non-interference in domestic affairs, and other mutual benefits, the two countries have agreed to strengthen ties and technical partnership, which had been initiated long time ago," Purnomo emphasized.

The new MoU covers cooperation through strategic dialogues on regional and international defense issues, defense officials exchange, involving both military and civil, and material cooperation that include production, maintenance and logistics support, transfer of technology, information exchange, defense personnel workshops, and the defense industry on the whole.

Besides that, Indonesia and the Netherlands will jointly cooperate to ensure mutual sharing of experiences related to the military law and history, disaster mitigation, knowledge and technology, military intelligence, maritime security, and also strengthen the military personnel of both countries through education and training, joint naval exercises, logistics, and peace-keeping operations.

Purnomo noted that the Netherlands had also offered full scholarships to the Indonesian navy cadets, so that they can study at the Netherlands Defense Academy.

With regard to the military sector, the Netherlands has offered graduate scholarships at the Leiden University for the defense personnel.

During the visit to the Netherlands, Purnomo and Plasschaert met and discussed about regional and international defense issues and the development of the Indonesian Navys Frigate ships project.

Minister Purnomo also visited the Damen Schelde Naval Shipbuilding (DSNS) in Vlissingen, Netherlands Defense Academy (NLDA) in Breda, Leiden University, and Dutch Organization for Applied Scientific Research (TNO) in Den Haag.

Air Force to add fighter squadron in eastern Indonesia

Jakarta Post - February 5, 2014

Jakarta – The Air Force is preparing the acquisition of additional jet fighters to establish a new squadron in eastern Indonesia, chief of staff Air Chief Marshal Ida Bagus Putu Dunia said Wednesday.

The squadron will be the country's easternmost air combat unit. "The plan to establish a fighter squadron in eastern Indonesia is part of the Air Force's grand design," he told Antara news agency in Biak, Papua.

"However, we must ready facilities, infrastructure, personnel and budget to establish a new fighter squadron." He did not say when exactly the squadron would be combat-ready, only that the Air Force was looking to acquire the fighters this year.

Currently, the 11th Air Squadron in Sultan Hasanuddin Air Force Base just outside Makassar, South Sulawesi, is the country's easternmost fighter squadron. The squadron is made up of Russian-made Sukhoi Su-27/30 Flanker heavy fighter jets.

Ida also said that the Air Force had established radar stations in Timika, Merauke and Biak to monitor air traffic in Papua. These radar stations fall under the jurisdiction of the IV Sector Command (Kosek) based in Biak, itself part of the National Air Defense Command (Kohanudnas). The IV Kosek also oversees another radar in Saumlaki, Maluku province. (krb)

Mining & energy

Indonesian minister tried but couldn't block his own mining law

Reuters - February 4, 2014

Wilda Asmarini & Kanupriya Kapoor, Jakarta – Indonesia's mines minister, Jero Wacik, has been on an unusual mission in recent months: finding a way out of implementing his own government's policy.

A smiling, well-rehearsed politician, Wacik was earlier tourism minister, pushing the charms of his native Bali Island and other Indonesian attractions. In 2011, he was given the role of supervising the country's $6 billion-a-year mining sector despite having no experience of the industry.

At the time, part of his job was to enforce a law President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono had pushed through, a bold ultimatum to the mining industry: process your ores in Indonesia by 2014 or stop exporting.

But around the middle of last year, the government came to the conclusion that a ban on the export of ore would hurt the economy and lead to job losses that would be damaging in the 2014 election year. Wacik tried postponing the law, but parliament, already tired of the administration's ambiguities, wouldn't play ball. He then tried to water it down, but was not successful.

Now the ultimatum has come into force, a self-inflicted crisis in a sector that accounts for 12 percent of the GDP of Southeast Asia's biggest economy.

"If this law was implemented completely, stopping everything, there would have been mass layoffs," Wacik told reporters. "But if there was to be zero layoffs, the law could not be implemented." "This was impossible. But the government had to find a way."

Indonesia is the world's biggest exporter of nickel ore, refined tin and thermal coal and is an important producer of copper and gold.

US mining giants Freeport-McMoRan Copper & Gold Inc and Newmont Mining Corp are among the hundreds of miners that have suspended ore and concentrates shipments.

When the law was enacted in 2009, it went down well at home, appealing to nationalist political sentiment at a time when commodity prices were still booming. It gave miners five years to stop exporting unprocessed ore and start investing in the refineries and smelters they would need to stay in business.

But the policy looked less promising as commodity prices came off the boil because of the slowdown in China. It also became clear that very few miners were able to comply or ever took the law seriously – and the result is that Indonesia's biggest export industry has come to a shuddering halt.

Hundreds of companies had told the government that they would construct the necessary refining facilities as required by the 2009 mining law. That proved to be wishful thinking.

"At the last minute, we evaluated all of their preparations," said Mineral Enterprise Director Dede Suhendra. "The fact was that many of those documents did not match what the companies had told us. They had promised to build smelters."

Everybody was angry

In early December, lawmakers denied Wacik's last-ditch request to delay the implementation of the mineral export ban by three years.

"Everybody was very angry that he was trying to introduce these changes. We didn't even listen to the rest (of what he had to say)," said Bobby Adithyo Rizaldi, a lawmaker on the energy and mines committee.

Given the fear of widespread layoffs, Wacik and his ministry now had just five weeks to find a way to water down the ban to save jobs and the economy, without breaking the law. And it went on until the final hour.

Wacik fought his case in an eight-hour cabinet meeting the evening before the ban was to go into force. He convinced Yudhoyono to significantly dilute its provisions, including changing the way the purity of concentrates was defined and freeing some miners from the purvey of the law, according to officials and ministers at the meeting.

But the new regulations were poorly defined and, at the last minute, the finance ministry insisted on a progressive export tax on concentrates, part of the move to force miners to process minerals in Indonesia and add value to exports.

When the law came into effect on Jan. 12, there was widespread policy confusion and one of the world's biggest mining industries swiftly shut down. Tens of thousands of people have been made jobless, trade groups say. "Our task is to create jobs. If the (new) policies cause mass layoffs, well then we were wrong," Wacik said.

However, he added the government's action in the end "was a good decision that is good for our country because it will protect the environment and increase the value (of our minerals)."

Train wreck

Indonesia is well known for its unpredictable regulatory environment but nevertheless, the latest policy mishap stands out. The government had since January 2009 to prepare for the law, and in the end still had to rush out rules that only added to the uncertainty.

"The whole situation we are facing now... has been like a slow-moving train wreck," said Andrew White, managing director of American Chamber of Commerce in Indonesia.

It hasn't helped that Wacik is an outsider to the mining industry. When Yudhoyono handpicked him to head the energy and mineral resources ministry, few in the industry had heard of his name – and Wacik himself had reservations about taking on the role.

An avid golfer who has a degree in mechanical engineering from Indonesia's Bandung Institute of Technology, Wacik is a trusted adviser to the president and a top official of the ruling Democratic Party.

Within his party, the minister is highly regarded because he is a self-made man and made his way up to a senior position, said two senior party officials. But critics describe the 64-year-old as arrogant and patronizing.

Many in the industry viewed his appointment as a political move by Yudhoyono. "We know Jero Wacik has integrity but in some technical aspects maybe his expertise is not that good," said parliamentarian Rizaldi. "His background is not in this business (of commodities)."

Canadian-based think-tank Fraser Institute has said Indonesia has become one of the worst countries to invest in mining under Wacik's watch, ranking it at the very bottom in a 2012 survey of 742 mining firms.

While mining firms await more clarity on the government's policy, Wacik has said the industry may have to undergo a one-year transition period and that small miners may have to reduce or momentarily halt operations.

"Once the smelters are finished, we will see mining (resume)," the minister said. "Their ore will be taken to domestic smelters. It cannot be taken to China or Korea. I think this is a good way out."

Economy & investment

Political, social turmoil limit Indonesia's growth, advisory firm says

Jakarta Globe - February 6, 2014

Vita A.D. Busyra, Jakarta – Despite being one of Asia's most active economies, drawing investors from around the world into a developing consumer market, Indonesia continues to struggle with political and social tensions that threaten the country's social and economic stability, a report says.

Indonesia is experiencing a few bumps in the road, according to Political Monitor, a political risk research and advisory firm. Although the country has demonstrated strong economic growth in recent years, its youth unemployment, government corruption, increasing ethnic and religious tensions, along with the emergence of a political power vacuum have put the nation in a challenging situation.

Indonesia's economy rose by 5.3 percent last year, but the upturn was considered the nation's slowest in the past four years.

Based on Asia Political Risk Index's political monitor, Indonesia's risk measurement relating to political and social turmoil scored 55 – a figure considered to be on the high side when compared to its neighbors Malaysia, Singapore, Australia, Taiwan, Thailand and China. The relative risk score chart is divided into five levels: low to moderate, high, very high and extreme. Political Monitor partner Damian Karmelich determined the impact of these tensions was not merely seen in the macro environment, but the underlying political and social matters that posed damaging risks in the upcoming decade.

"For many countries the macro environment looks very positive. Growing economies with emerging middle classes present exciting new opportunities for investors," he said. "However, the best opportunities have significant risks. For some high levels of youth unemployment, entrenched government corruption, growing inequality, exposure to volatile food prices or rising levels of external debt threaten political and social stability over coming years. Many Asian countries share these underlying social and political characteristics."

Exports, spending prop up economy

Jakarta Post - February 6, 2014

Satria Sambijantoro, Jakarta – Government spending and exports became the main driver of gross domestic product (GDP) growth last year and managed to offset a decline in investment.

Despite volatility in the financial market, the economy expanded by 5.72 percent in the fourth quarter, higher than 5.62 percent posted a quarter earlier, the Central Statistics Agency (BPS) reported Wednesday.

Observers previously expected Indonesia to see further slowdown, as the consensus of economists, as well as the government, predicted that the economy might only grow by 5.3 percent in the fourth quarter.

Expectations of a slowdown grew after Bank Indonesia (BI) performed bold monetary tightening to put the brakes on the too-fast economy. Last year, the central bank hiked its key interest rates by 175 basis points to 7.5 percent to push down the current-account deficit and inflation, both of which were on the rise and posed risks of overheating.

"This shows that Indonesia's economic fundamentals are strong, as efforts to push down current-account deficit and inflation can be achieved with quite good economic growth," BI Deputy Governor Perry Warjiyo said on Wednesday.

The fourth quarter results took full-year 2013 economic growth to 5.78 percent, the second-highest among G20 economies after China, cementing the archipelago's status among the world's most resilient economies amid uncertainties in the external environment.

However, growth in 2013 was the lowest in four years.

While household-consumption growth stood strong on a year-on-year basis, gross fixed capital formations (PMTB) growth – an indicator of investment – saw a significant decline to 4.7 percent throughout last year, compared to 9.8 percent in 2012, due to BI's monetary tightening.

The decline in investments was offset by the surge of growth in exports and government spending, both of which accelerated by 5.3 percent and 4.9 percent, respectively.

Exports only grew by 2 percent while government spending expanded by a modest 1.3 percent in 2012.

"The fact that contribution from government spending was high showed that our programs to accelerate fund disbursement had bore fruit," Finance Minister Chatib Basri told reporters in his Jakarta office.

Meanwhile, exports were on the upward trajectory because of signs of improvement in the global economy, notably in the US, the minister said.

The pick-up in economic growth was the second time Indonesia posted economic data surprises. Earlier this week, the BPS reported that trade surplus was US$1.5 billion in December – twice higher than economists' estimates.

Improvements in economic data shows that investors might have been too bearish on Indonesia, with a massive sell-off of rupiah assets last year occurring because investors "overpriced" the country's macro-fundamental risks, analysts from Societe Generale said recently.

In an interview with The Jakarta Post recently, US economist Nouriel Roubini also said that there should not be unwarranted concern over the slowdown.

Indonesia's annual GDP growth could return to above 6 percent by 2015, said Roubini, the so-called "Dr. Doom" who correctly predicted the last US financial crisis.

However, others warned it was still too early for policy makers to become complacent.

The latest economic growth pickup might not represent a trend reversal, warned Citi Research economist Helmi Arman, who argued that the economy might be heading toward a "soft landing".

"Firstly, domestic demand is still tempered," he explained in a research note. "Secondly, we do not think the export volume increase in the fourth quarter is sustainable, as it was not broad based and driven somewhat by ore exports, which will not continue in 2014."

Analysis & opinion

Sex, lies and politicians

Inside Indonesia - January-March, 2014

Edward Aspinall – Everyone in Indonesia is familiar with the case of Ariel, arguably Indonesia's best-known pop star, who went to jail in early 2011 when videos of him having sex with a couple of famous and beautiful television celebrities went viral on the internet.

The videos had been taken by him for his own private use. They were leaked onto the internet in circumstances that remain murky (Ariel claims his laptop was stolen), but probably had a lot to do with someone bearing a personal grudge. Remarkably, despite all the predictable condemnations of Ariel by religious leaders and other guardians of public morality, his fan base remained loyal. There were 'free Ariel' protests outside the courtroom and jail and, upon his release, Ariel went on to record, with his renamed band, Noah, one of Indonesia's bestselling pop albums of all time. The case was at once an example of the prurient moralism that can affect Indonesian public culture, but also a refreshing reminder of many Indonesians' open- mindedness when it comes to sexual matters.

Ariel's case is just one example of a furore involving a sex movie and a famous Indonesian. As in other countries, sex videos featuring singers, actors and other celebrities have made their way onto the internet and into public consciousness. A little more unusual is the large number of politicians who are stars in their own porn films (though perhaps we should add the word 'allegedly' here, because in many cases discussed in this article the individuals concerned claim that it was not them, but a lookalike, in the starring role). Over the last ten years, there have been about a dozen cases in which local government heads (governors, district heads and mayors) have been captured on film either having sex or in states of undress with members of the opposite sex, with those films then being distributed on the internet, between mobile telephones, via DVDs and by other means. There are also similar cases involving other senior politicians, notably members of the DPR, Indonesia's national parliament. If you care to check, just type into Google or some other search engine a phrase like 'video mesum anggota DPR' ('DPR member dirty video') and you will get a surprising number of hits.

Unlike Ariel, so far none of these politicians have ended up in jail. In fact, with a couple of exceptions, their political careers have rarely suffered. But why should there have been so many such public exposes in the first case, and what do they tell us about political power in Indonesia, and about changing attitudes to sex? To account for the spread of the phenomenon, we need to look not only at the Indonesian public's thirst for titillation, but also to the nature of electoral competition in the new Indonesia, and to the rise of new communication technologies that make it much easier to capture and distribute images of sex – with or without the knowledge or permission of the participants. Whatever their cause, these cases also throw a bright and strange new light on the disjuncture between public morality and private sexual behaviour in Indonesia.

Sex on film

Let's start by getting a sense of the topic at hand. The first politician sex tape scandal I became aware of was in 2007 when videos of a man who was purportedly Syahrul Ahmad Limpo, then deputy governor of South Sulawesi, scion of a major local political dynasty in the province, and soon to be elected as the South Sulawesi governor, were distributed in the province. A friend, rather embarrassingly, pulled out a laptop at a hotel cafe in Jakarta and showed me and a group of companions the video of a man having sex with a woman. The video didn't leave a lot to the imagination, with the man in the frame holding a remote control that he used to zoom in on areas of particular interest. Despite the very clear face shots in the video, Limpo never commented on the video and its wide circulation it didn't stop him winning his election.

A bit of research, mostly on the internet, shows that there had been other cases. The earliest I have discovered involved the mayor of Singkawang in West Kalimantan. Awang Ishak was elected in 2002, but in 2005-06 (according to the website of the Sinar Harapan newspaper) a sex video involving him and a middle aged woman called Anita Tjhung started to be passed around town. Awang lost his bid to be reelected in 2007. He subsequently had a 'secret marriage' (nikah siri) with a woman called Tjhai Nyit Khim, despite the very public objections of his first wife, Yutina. Even so, Awang ran again as mayor in 2012 in a campaign that relied heavily on Islamic discourse and pitched Awang as the sole Islamic candidate in a town that is more or less evenly divided between Muslims (mostly Malays) and non-Muslims (mostly Chinese). He won the election. Though he seemed to have put the video behind him, his personal matters were still a source of public controversy (Yutina was one participant in a large demonstration shortly after the election calling for the local council to refuse to swear him in). Even so, he was the consummate survivor and rules untroubled today.

The first case involving a female politician also dates from around this time. In the district of Pekalongan, Central Java, photos of a couple who looked like a district head candidate, Siti Qomariyah and her deputy, Wahyudi Pontjo Nugroho, first circulated in the lead up to the local government election in 2006. The couple won the election, making Siti one of Indonesia's few female local government heads; a rival unsuccessfully tried to use the photos to annul the result. The pictures were distributed even more widely in the lead up to Siti and Wahyudi's re-election bid in 2011, which they lost. A fake facebook account was set up in their name with the photos (most of which featured 'Siti' in a bra, but some being more revealing), declaring that 'Intimacy is our start-up capital for building a joint commitment to be bupati and deputy bupati... but so is our hobby of unleashing our lusts on Valentine's day.' Both of them denied it was them in the photos.

In 2009, in the district of Sula Archipelago, North Maluku province, a two minute video allegedly showed the district head and local Golkar chairperson, Ahmad Hidayat Musa, having sex with a senior public servant in the district. The video prompted protests from various youth groups calling for Hidayat to be sacked. He denied it was him: 'I'm not bald and I'm not old,' he told the press, 'I've looked at that video and I'm completely convinced it's not me.' He accused his political opponents of manufacturing the issue in the lead up to the local government head election in 2010. He won the election (though he has since been charged with corruption in a mosque construction project).

Another case involving a woman politician occurred in 2010 in the famously resource-rich district of Kutai Kertanegara in East Kalimantan. In a case of dynastic succession, Rita Widyasari, the daughter of Syaukani Hasan Rais, was running as district head to take over from her father after he had been convicted of corruption in 2007. A video showed a couple – apparently acting in a movie of their own – entering a room, watching a pornographic film and having sex. Rita's political opponents tried to use the video to bring her down. There were demonstrations, and the video was widely distributed in the district, but Rita won anyway. According to the merdeka.com website (a prime source for titillating sexual stories of this sort) someone from the local branch of her Golkar party said that they would not take action against her because the man in the video was her husband, though other reports said it was a previous boyfriend.

More recently, in February 2013, in Bangkalan in Madura, photos were distributed that allegedly showed the newly elected bupati, Makmun Ibnu Fuad, in bed with a woman. They became public just after he was elected but before he was officially sworn in. Makmun, Indonesia's youngest bupati at only 26 years old, was the son of the previous bupati – another case of dynastic succession – and had won a landslide victory with over 90 per cent of the vote. News sites report that local religious scholars and NGOs took the images to the police, and there were demonstrations in which protestors held banners featuring enormous pictures of the photos. As far as I am aware, however, nothing became of the case.

Late in 2013, a sex video featuring the head of Mappi district in Papua, Stevanus Kaisma, was widely distributed in the district. According to Kaisma's supporters, the video had been taken secretly by the woman involved in the liaison, who had carefully kept her face out of the shot, as part of an elaborate entrapment exercise engineered by Kaisma's political opponents. Not only was the whole scam, it was alleged, set up by members of the 'success team' of Kaisma's chief rival, but the woman in the shot was now standing as a legislative candidate for one of the Islamic parties in nearby Merauke.

One of the more intriguing cases, and the only one I am aware of that has actually resulted in a prosecution is in the district (not city) of Bogor in West Java. Here, the deputy bupati, Karyawan Faturahman, has been charged with distributing a pornographic video involving a political rival from his own PDI-P party. He was also accused of paying a sex worker tens of millions of rupiah to make the video, and an accomplice has already been sentenced to one year's jail for distributing the video (Karyawan's own case was not finished at the time this piece was finalised).

These cases do not exhaust the list. Internet sources also describe cases involving the district heads, mayors or deputies in Banjarmasin in South Kalimantan, Palembang in South Sumatra, East Jabung in Jambi, and Central Lombok.

Then there are the cases involving other sorts of politicians, such as parliamentarians. These include one of the few cases that had a negative impact on a politician's career, involving videos of a naked (and rather chubby) DPR member and Golkar politician Yahya Zaini, which appeared mysteriously on the internet in 2006. Also in the video was an equally naked Maria Ulfah (aka Maria Eva), a dangdut singer. Maria Eva told the media that the couple were not married when the video was taken and that she had become pregnant and had an abortion (she later said that they had a secret marriage at the time). Yahya resigned from his positions in Golkar; Maria Eva later unsuccessfully tried to run as the district head of Sidoarjo in East Java.

Finally, one of the more notorious of recent cases involves another DPR member, Karolin Margret Natasa. From PDI-P, she is the daughter of the governor of West Kalimantan. In another video that has gone viral on the internet (this seems to be the case for all the videos involving women politicians), it is alleged that she appears with fellow parliamentarian, Aria Bima, though both have strongly denied involvement. The case is being investigated by PDI-P's political opponents via the Disciplinary Committee of the DPR, who have said they are going to call experts to see if they can identify the people in the video.

The politics of sex

Sex scandals involving politicians happen in every country. They are hardly a specialty of Indonesia. But such a large number of actual sex videos allegedly involving politicians does seem to be unusual. What explains it?

One starting point is that almost all the videos have been distributed as part of attempts to discredit the politicians concerned. In a few cases, the videos themselves were taken secretly by the politician's opponents and it seems at least in a couple of cases they involved entrapment – engaging the target politician in a sexual act in order to capture it on film covertly. As we have seen, the politicians almost always deny involvement, and it's possible that some of the videos do in fact feature lookalikes. But even when the videos were apparently taken with politicians' consent, they have made their way into the public arena as a result of actions by their enemies.

In this regard, then, the sex videos are just one part of the hidden side of electioneering in Indonesia. The public face of election campaigns in Indonesia is often fairly anodyne, with dull speeches, lots of singing and dancing and formulaic policy promises. But these vanilla-flavoured public campaigns are almost always accompanied by so-called 'black campaigns'. These are more or less deliberately engineered campaigns of rumour and innuendo accusing candidates of any number of sins: corruption, nepotism or other forms of illegal behaviour; polygamy; underworld connections; ethnic bias; religious laxness or heresy; hidden agendas and conspiracies of various sorts; and, of course, sexual infidelities or peculiarities of many kinds.

Almost every candidate will be confronted by a black campaign, typically distributed by way of anonymous leaflets, sms messages, and, increasingly, social network sites. Often, these under-the-radar campaigns can tip an election one way or the other, and they typically provide most of the spice that comes with an election. Sex videos are thus just one part of a wider set of underhanded strategies that candidates can use against their rivals. It seems such videos are often considered to be especially potent when targeted at religious networks, or at networks of women voters. Women voters are often viewed as being particularly hostile to any sort of behaviour by male politicians that harm their wives (for this reason, polygamous men are often punished at the ballot box).

I recently met one candidate in a mayoral election in West Java whose name was similar to a national politician alleged to feature in one of the widely distributed sex videos. Local Islamic leaders who were otherwise inclined to support him were so worried about this that they asked him directly about it and expressed great relief – shouting out Allahu Akbar! – when he assured them it wasn't him.

Sex and public culture

But what makes such tapes such a potentially potent force – and one that typically attracts attention far beyond the province or district where the election is staking place – is how they place pressure on deeper faultlines within sexual culture.

Indonesia's formal public political culture is, on the whole, rather conservative on sexual matters. In recent years this became most evident with the passage, in 2008, of an anti-pornography law that defined pornography and pornographic acts in very loose and potentially all- encompassing terms. The criminal code outlaws adultery under certain conditions. Typically, it is the Islamic parties who are identified as the source of moral puritanism in national politics, but in fact conservatism goes much more widely than this. President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, for example, is famously prim on sexual matters and has complained several times in public about women entertainers who display their belly buttons.

Yet anyone who has spent any time in Indonesia knows that this prudish public culture bears little relation to how many Indonesians actually live their lives. In private and often semi-public situations, ribald sexual innuendo and joking is part of everyday conversation. Pre-marital sex may be frowned upon, but it is commonplace. So are extra-marital affairs. There is a massive and diverse commercial sex industry, much of it taking place in quasi-legal complexes known as 'lokalisasi'; even outside these areas police and other security officials are almost always involved in running and protecting the industry.

And for members of the political elite, power can bring sex in ways that have little to do with the public version of propriety they peddle. For example, using the services of commercial sex workers appears to be a common practice among male politicians; indeed, investigations by Indonesia's Corruption Eradication Commission have revealed that sessions with prostitutes are often gifted as a form of bribe in political corruption cases. At the same time, male politicians are often involved in sexual relationships that might fall short of out-and-out commercial sex but that nevertheless have a strong element of commercial exchange: witness the large number of dangdut singers, models and other minor celebrities who become attached to politicians.

In one notorious recent example, in 2012 Ahmad Fathanah, the aide to the president of the Islamist – and extremely moralist – Prosperous Justice Party was arrested in flagrante delicto, naked in a hotel room with a female university student for his part in a massive graft case involving the sale of beef import licenses. It later transpired that he had channeled an extraordinary amount of gifts and cash to 38 women, with single transactions ranging from 40 million rupiah (about US$3,300) to 1 billion rupiah (US$82,000). Most of the women were described as having professions such as swimsuit models, dangdut singers and soap opera actors.

This disjuncture between public conservatism and private license fuels mass interest in the sexual behaviour of people in power, as part of a broader suspicion that all power-holders are basically cheats and hypocrites anyway. Such curiosity is longstanding. Thus, in the past, there were numerous lurid rumours about the sexual peccadilloes of members of the Suharto family. I recall stories from the 1990s of rampant lesbianism, orgies in airplanes and other goings-on allegedly involving Suharto's children and grandchildren. During his term as president, Abdurrahman Wahid was exposed in the national media as having an affair with a middle-aged woman ('It's a sin, but we can always repent later,' he was reported as having told the woman in question).

Further back, attitudes were more muscular. President Sukarno in particular gained kudos for stories of his sexual prowess. He was the only Indonesian president to have had multiple wives. In one presumably apocryphal but endlessly retold story, the Soviet intelligence services were said to have taken a secret film of him having sex with a Russian woman during a visit to Moscow (in other versions it was the CIA and the film was made during a visit to the US). Their plans for blackmail fell flat when Sukarno expressed delight with the film and, so the story goes, asked to take copies of the film back with him to Indonesia. But Sukarno was perhaps the last Indonesian leader to openly boast of his sexual conquests. Since that time a gossamer curtain of propriety has fallen over discussion of sexual matters in formal political settings.

Sex and technology

If rumours and gossip were the traditional way to bridge the gulf between the public discourse and the private practice, in recent years another method has emerged: technology. Cameras in mobile telephones, the internet, USB sticks and other innovations have led to a proliferation of sexual footage and made it much easier to share such material, including anonymously via social media. In other words, technology has not only made it easy to capture and distribute such images, it also dilutes and disguises responsibility for doing so. Politicians whose names have been associated with sex videos often say they will sue those responsible for naming them or for distributing the videos, but such people can be very hard to track down.

The rise of the politician sex video has happened at the same time that there has been an explosion of technology-facilitated, home-grown and mostly DIY pornography in Indonesia. Years ago, most pornography that circulated in Indonesia was imported and distributed hand to hand. Digital technology has changed all that. Despite the fact that pornography is still often described as a threat that emanates from outside the country, politician sex videos are only a tiny fraction of the Indonesian pornography that now circulates on the internet.

Indonesians seem to have a particular predilection for 'candid camera' style pornography in which the participants are purportedly unaware of being captured on film. This style of porn is common the world over, its special appeal in Indonesia presumably reflects the satisfaction and delight many people feel in catching others engaged in sexual behavior which is officially designated as illicit. All the more so when those caught out are in positions of authority. Thus, along with the usual range of school kids, university students, housewives and similar categories who feature in such clips, there are numerous examples on the internet of public servants being caught on film having illicit sex. Public servants are not deemed a particularly sexy category in most countries, but in Indonesia they are typically among the most respectable authority figures in their local areas. Catching them having sex on film helps bring them down a notch or two, and speaks to wider beliefs about the corruption, immorality and laziness of the bureaucracy.

It's a dirty business

In summary, then, it's possible to read the epidemic of politician sex videos in multiple ways. Viewing them positively, we can think of them as a sign of the Indonesian public's willingness to separate the private and public spheres, by ignoring the sexual indiscretions of their leaders. After all, very few of the politicians concerned have been brought down by these scandals. It's hard to imagine, say, a governor in the United States surviving the sort of public notoriety that Syahrul Ahmad Limpo enjoyed for a while when his (alleged) home movie first emerged. In the United States, it should be said, it is possible to survive a sex scandal, usually by way of public expressions of contrition; in Indonesia, most politicians simply tough it out and ignore the videos, or deny it was them.

Shift the perspective just a little, however, and this very same outcome seems like a sign of the continuing hypocrisy of Indonesia's political bosses, and of their ability to maintain themselves in power even when flagrantly violating local norms. In this regards, the most apt comparison is perhaps Italy's Berlusconi, who was able to survive politically in what is in many ways a conservative nation, despite his 'bunga-bunga' parties and liaisons with underage prostitutes. Pornography is vigorously condemned right across the political spectrum in Indonesia, and some of the politicians who have been caught on film also cloak themselves in religion and morality when they campaign for office. Viewed in this light, surviving a sex video looks a more like surviving a corruption scandal than standing up for the sanctity of the private sphere.

But there's another way to view these sex videos, too: as one more sign of the remarkable democratisation of political life that has occurred in Indonesia. These videos are a by-product of a new no-holds-barred style of competition that has come to characterise Indonesian electoral politics. Nobody can believe Indonesian elections are lethargic affairs when competitors routinely use such dirty tricks against each other. Perhaps more deeply yet, these videos have the unexpected effect of humanising politicians, and bringing them down to earth. There was a time when Indonesian political leaders strove to achieve qualities of dignified detachment and calm poise in their public presentation. Nothing punctures that balloon quite like being exposed on the internet as a sweaty, grunting person engaging in one of the most basic of human functions.

[Edward Aspinall (edward.aspinall@anu.edu.au) researches Indonesian politics at the Australian National University and is an editor of Inside Indonesia.]

A Forgotten Genocide

York Vision - February 4, 2014

Tom Davies – Imagine a protest. A protest against the actions of a tyrannical, oppressive military administration totally intolerant of dissent.

Now imagine that protest was broken up in a coordinated attack by police and military forces, killing dozens of unarmed civilians and capturing many others. Imagine many of those taken into custody being raped, tortured and horrifically mutilated by their captors. Now where would you imagine events like this would have taken place? Syria perhaps? Or maybe North Korea? Perhaps under one of the particularly bloodthirsty dictatorships in Africa or South America? You would consider something like this a massacre. A heinous crime by a government against its people which you would hope would cause an outcry from the international community.

You'd be wrong on all counts. The events described took place in 1998, in a place which, were it not for its political situation might be considered a paradise in the middle of the south pacific. You've probably never even heard of it before, just as you've probably never heard of the 1998 Biak Massacre before. Events like these are not unusual there; they're framed against a backdrop of half of century of conflict and aggressive military occupation. They call this region West Papua, but you may know it best as the other half of the island upon which sits Papua New Guinea, a place better known internationally for debatable tales of cannibalism than its neighbour, which has been occupied by Indonesia since the 1960s, where atrocities and conflict are an all too regular occurrence.

I first learned about West Papua almost by sheer chance when attending a panel debate in London last year. The debate was on outmanoeuvring tyranny and included figures such as the legal representative of the Free Syrian Army and a noted anti government activist from Azerbaijan. However it was a strange figure sitting at the end of the panel that seemed of most interest to the crowd, resplendent in a Hawaiian shirt and tribal headdress. The head of the panel introduced him as Benny Wenda, an independence leader from West Papua. Wenda was 37 years old at the time, but you could be forgiven for thinking him ten years older, which in the context of his life is hardly surprising.

Wenda was born in 1975 in Baliem Valley in the West Papuan highlands, thirteen years after the Indonesian annexation of the region. When he was just one years old the Indonesian military bombed his village in response to an uprising of the highland Lani people against Indonesian military rule. Many of Wenda's family were killed in the repeated airstrikes and he himself incurred a severe leg injury, resulting in impaired growth. For the next six years Wenda and many other West Papuan highlanders lived in hiding in the jungles of central West Papua. After the Lani people finally surrendered to the Indonesian government, he went on to study at a University in Jayapura, West Papua's largest city, and became a noted independence leader and Secretary General of Demmak, the Koteka Tribal Assembly.

In 2002 Wenda was imprisoned for leading a procession at an Independence rally which allegedly turned violent. This occurred during a clampdown on the Independence Movement only a few months after the assassination of noted pro-independence figure Theys Eluay. Facing a 25 year prison sentence, Wenda escaped from custody whilst on trial and was able to flee across the border to Papua New Guinea, where he was reunited with his wife, Maria, at a refugee camp and granted political asylum in the United Kingdom. He now lives with his family just outside Oxford, and campaigns for West Papuan Independence at events such as the one I attended.

During the debate in London it was Wenda that stole the show. Under any other normal circumstances any of the other panellists, distinguished activists and campaigners all would have been of great interest to any self-respecting political wonk. But it was Wenda who captured the imagination of the audience; his story was so tragically untold, half of the well educated crowd had until that morning not even been aware that the land of his birth existed. His story was so beautifully sad, so poignant and when he rounded off his plea with a rendition of a song he had written whilst imprisoned on a handmade ukulele painted with the flag of West Papua independence, you could see some members of the audience barely able to choke back tears. Which, in a room filled with hardnosed young political activists and other assorted current affairs buffs, is quite something indeed.

West Papua is often labelled as a forgotten genocide. The atrocities committed by the Indonesian government are simply too diplomatically unimportant, too far outside of western spheres of influence to be deemed worthy of much note by most media sources, or of much action by western governments. The conflict is completely unheard of by the vast majority of people, but it is estimated that 100,000 people have been displaced, and from 100,000 to over 400,000 people may have died over the past fifty years; a high proportion of those civilians. Countless Independence leaders have been arrested, imprisoned or assassinated by the Indonesian military. However, despite the occupiers worst excesses, the United Nations has provided Indonesia with diplomatic support and neighbouring nations, such as Papua New Guinea and Australia, have pursued policies of appeasement towards Indonesian control of West Papua. Apart from a handful of activists and politicians abroad, the West Papuan people stand virtually alone, deprived of their right to self determination and largely ignored by the international community.

The scale of the violence in such a reasonably small and sparsely populated nation is equalled only by the excessiveness of the Indonesian response to pro-independence activities. In 1978, five leaders of pro-independence faction, the OPM, surrendered to save the village they were caught in and were subsequently beaten to death with red hot iron bars and their bodies thrown into a pit latrine. The 125 villagers were then machine gunned down as suspected OPM sympathisers. In 1981, 10 Papuans were killed and 58 disappeared without a trace in the Paniai region, whilst later that year an estimated 13,000 Papuans were killed in the central highlands from September to December. On June 24 1985 in the same region, 2,500 people were killed in a single day. In July 2009, after the raising of the Morning Star flag (an act deemed illegal by the Indonesian government) in the West Papuan village of Jugum, more than 30 homes were burnt to the ground by the military, and in 2011 at least five people were killed when police opened fire on an independence rally. These are just a snapshot of the extreme violence committed during a conflict, which shows no signs of stopping.

Indonesia has found in West Papua what might be referred to as its Vietnam. A war it can never truly win against an indigenous populace who clearly do not accept its place as their vassal. The difference is, despite the brutal methods and significant military might used to quash the dissent, the violence has continued unabated for over fifty years. Indonesia has not relented in its claims of sovereignty over the region and, whilst its activities in West Papua remain shielded from international scrutiny, why would it?