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Introduction
Dita Indah Sari -- then Indonesia's only woman political prisoner -- was sentenced to five years jail on April 22, 1997. Her "crime" was daring to fight alongside Indonesian workers struggling for a better life.
Like Dita, thousands of the regime's opponents -- communists, radical nationalists, students, Muslims and labour activists -- have been tried for subversion and other political "crimes".
Political prisoners in particular, are often held under intolerable conditions -- poor food, limited access to friends and relatives, overcrowding, inadequate recreational activity, no provision of reading or writing materials, radio or newspapers. Many are denied access to legal protection and are detained for long periods before going to trial even though the state has yet to prove a case against them.
Indonesia has signed, but not ratified, the 1987 UN Convention Against Torture. Nor is it party to other international treaties such as the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. The US State Department in its 1992 country report concluded that in Indonesia "torture and mistreatment of criminal suspects, detainees, and prisoners are common, and the legal protections are violated by the government".
Indonesia's criminal code, enacted in 1981 and confirmed again in 1997, formally established judicial independence and the concept of separation of powers, and it includes some mechanisms to prevent the unlawful arrest and ill-treatment of suspects.
In practice, however, obstacles such as lack of counsel, consultations between judges and the military and the control of the appointment of judges by the government ensure that judges have a strong bias against defendants. Guilty until proved innocent is the rule.
Those who seek to exercise their legal rights are often subjected to harassment and threats of rearrest and torture. Lawyers also have been targets of intimidation. Direct military interference in the courts is particularly evident in political trials and in regions where there is a large military presence such as East Timor, Aceh and West Papua.
Even formal protections can easily be sidestepped by charging suspects under the Anti-Subversion Laws, which carry a maximum penalty of death and prohibit a wide and largely undefined array of political activity. These laws essentially allow the military to act as if there is a state of national emergency and to do whatever they like in political cases.
After gaining independence, Indonesia adopted the existing repressive political laws in its entirety. Suharto expanded these laws in 1969 to penalise any activity deemed to be inconsistent with, distort, undermine or deviate from the state ideology of Pancasila (as defined by the government). In a report on the Indonesian legal system, the Lawyers Committee For Human Rights described the law as a vague and broadly defined statute which can be used whenever the regime wishes to persecute someone for exercising their fundamental rights to freedom, assembly, association and religion. Amnesty International estimates that more than 150 prisoners of conscience have been convicted and are being held under these and related laws.
Following massive riots at the Madaeng prison in Surabaya, East Java, where Dita was jailed, she was moved to a smaller, more isolated prison called Kebon Waru in the small east Javanese city of Malang.
Dita is the only political prisoner in Kebon Waru and it is far more difficult for friends and family to visit. Unlike other prisoners, visits are restricted to 30 minutes and even then, family members are often not even allowed to see her. She has no access to newspapers, radio or television except for cartoons. Kept in isolation she is not allowed to have contact with other prisoners. These conditions mean that her situation is far more difficult than for the other People's Democratic Party prisoners. On October 22, 1997 her family and lawyers lodged an official complaint to the governments National Human Rights. To date, the commission has failed to respond at all.
On November 15, 1997, Dita was evacuated to a nearby hospital with a severe case of typhoid and is now is in intensive care. As this book goes to print, she is still unconscious and has to be fed by a drip. Typhoid is usually associated with unsanitary living and eating conditions.
This is the story of an activist, a feminist and a trade unionist who dared to challenge the Suharto regime -- whose courage, tireless struggle and self-sacrifice has won the respect of activists and ordinary Indonesians alike. Dita's story is the story of one activist among many fighting for the rights of Indonesian workers and for an end to the brutal Suharto dictatorship.
Postscript
Dita is currently incarcerated in the West Tengerang Women's Prison n the outskirts of Jakarta. She was move there after international protests about the conditions in Malang Prison, where she contracted typhus in November 1997.