View from Jakarta: World Statements Against Religious Violence

SBY Is No Statesman! Peaceful Picket Thursday, May 30, 2013, 5:30-7:30pmThe Pierre Hotel, 2 E 61st St., New York City Oppose the World Statesman Award to President Yudhoyono  from the Appeal of Conscience Foundation Bring your own signs and banners highlighting the ongoing human rights issues in Indonesia, including attacks on religious freedom, lack of justice for past human rights violations, and ongoing rights abuses in West Papua and elsewhere. Event on Facebook (Should the Appeal of Conscience Foundation withdraw the award, we will hold a celebration outside the hotel.) Map Download, print and distribute flyer promoting demonstration (PDF) contact ETAN for more information or to help

by Rev. Elice Higginbotham, 

Member, Executive Committee, East Timor and Indonesia Action Network

JAKARTA, May 26 – The President was absent from the presentation ceremony for his award.

So the crowd of Christians, Shia and Amhadiyya Muslims, followers of indigenous religions, women’s rights advocates,and other victims of violence against religious and other minorities carried the “World Statements Against Religious Violence” Award through the streets of Jakarta’s National Palace District and presented it at the palace gate.

SBY was not really expected at a Christian worship service, particularly not the semi-weekly presence of the congregations and friends of the GKI Yasmin and the HKPB Fildelfia congregations who conduct an open-air, right-under-his-nose service to remind him, and the surrounding city, that they are not permitted to worship on their own property because the state refuses to enforce their constitutionally guaranteed rights.

Today’s service, however, was an expanded, multi-faith event, intended to highlight widespread opposition to/offense at the “World Statesman Award” from the New York-based Appeal of Conscience Foundation, slated for presentation on May 30.  We arrived a little early to find a gathering crowd carrying both handmade signs and organizational banners, including demonstrators and speakers from beyond Jakarta, some from as far away as Aceh and Kupang.  As the service began, two women, one wearing a sash saying “No Award to SBY,” lay down at the front of the crowd to represent victims killed in religious violence.

(For the first time in my experience in Indonesia, I was questioned by police.  A rather quick and clever woman danced over to me, waving her cellphone camera, and asked what Indonesians occasionally do when encountering a foreigner in an interesting public spot – “Photo?  Take my photo with you?”  She handed her  camera to someone else in the crowd and put her arm around me, beaming into the sunshine. Then… she began asking me who I was, why I was there, how I found out about the event.  Simply on the basis of her appearance, I unconsciously assumed she was part of the demo.  However, few minutes later, I saw her chatting with uniformed police on the sidelines of the demonstration area; she caught my eye, called me over, and asked me to reiterate my information, which I realized she was writing down.  I stopped and asked, “Excuse me, may I ask who wants to know?”  Smiling  her friendly smile, she said, “I’m a policewoman.”  A journalist friend commented later that I’d probably been noted as the first obvious foreigner on the scene.)


Aside from the presence of more cameras and a more diverse congregation (and the two “dead” women), the service was its usual, thoughtfully-prepared fairly ordinary Christian Sunday worship, distinguished only by the multiplicity of posters and signs calling for implementation of religious rights and the concluding enthusiastic unison rendition of the National Anthem.  As the worship concluded,  however, it was clear that things weren’t over.

A six-foot-high, black-draped object, looking like a tall black ghost, was rolled out.  Representatives of the various groups recently victimized by religious violence took their places at the front.  And, instead of the “World Statesman” Award – the “World Statements Against Religious Violence” Award was unveiled: a gold foil-covered tower, topped by the Indonesian symbols of Garuda and Pancasila, and decorated with photo after photo of incidents of religious violence in Indonesia… burning churches… bruised bodies… disrupted worship services… demonstrations… funerals….

Representatives of victimized groups each made their statements, witnessing to personal and community suffering.  Concluding prayer was offered.

Then the monument was lifted up onto shoulders and carried toward the street.  Police officers (colleagues of the woman who questioned me) obligingly stopped traffic as the crowd crossed, SBY’s award moving ahead of us, leading us toward the entrance to the National Palace.  The crowd sang patriotic songs.

We were greeted by an unsurprisingly closed and well-guarded gate.  A pastor made a statement about the award and about our presence, and then turned to the security guards on the other side of the gate.  A period of negotiation ensued, resulting in what appeared to be an agreement  to open the gate just enough to allow the award to the slipped through, with a note of explanation to the President.  Someone bent a back to offer a flat surface, someone else wrote the note, which was handed to a guard, and the golden tower was passed through the gate and onto the Palace grounds.

Cameras clicked, more patriotic choruses were sung as the “World Statements Against Religious Violence” Award was hoisted onto the shoulders of Palace security personnel, carried along the path until it disappeared around a corner, looking for all the world as if borne by a guard of honor.

see also 

• View from Jakarta: The room was papered - literally - with signatures
• View from Jakarta: No World Statesman Award for Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono
• ETAN: Urge the Appeal of Conscience Foundation to Withdraw World Statesman Award to Indonesia's President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono

 

View from Jakarta: The room was papered - literally - with signatures

SBY Is No Statesman! Peaceful Picket Thursday, May 30, 2013, 5:30-7:30pm The Pierre Hotel, 2 E 61st St., New York City Oppose the World Statesman Award to President Yudhoyono  from the Appeal of Conscience Foundation Bring your own signs and banners highlighting the ongoing human rights issues in Indonesia, including attacks on religious freedom, lack of justice for past human rights violations, and ongoing rights abuses in West Papua and elsewhere. Event on Facebook (Should the Appeal of Conscience Foundation withdraw the award, we will hold a celebration outside the hotel.) Map Download, print and distribute flyer promoting demonstration (PDF) contact ETAN for more information or to help

by Rev. Elice Higginbotham, 

Member, Executive Committee, East Timor and Indonesia Action Network

JAKARTA  -- The room was papered - literally - with signatures.

The Setara Institute for Democracy and Peace convened a media conference of the Civil Society Coalition for Freedom of Religion/Conviction Thursday, May 23, at a Jakarta hotel. A wide range of NGOs, human rights organizations, and representatives of minority religious organizations - non-Sunni Muslims, Christians, "non-recognized" religious groups - gathered to express their opposition to the "World Statesman Award" that the New York-based Appeal of Conscience Foundation proposes to present on May 30 to Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono. 

"No Award For SBY," an on-line petition by ETAN and another Indonesia-based one, were the visual symbols of broad, unified Indonesian and international opposition to the Foundation's choice: The walls of the room were covered with page after page of the names of signers, surrounding the 17 speakers, the TV cameras, print reporters, bloggers and interested others. 

Petition signatures paper the wall.

I met and spoke briefly with Imam Shofwan, a young journalist who grew up in a traditional Islamic political organization. He expresses deep offense at the idea of honoring SBY while religious violence is on the increase in Indonesia and the government refuses to enforce the rights of religious minorities.  Imam generated his own on-line petition, initially in support of an open letter by an Indonesian Jesuit professor of philosophy who wrote the Appeal of Conscience Foundation a painstakingly-worded critique of SBY's failures of leadership with regard to the protection of minority rights. Imam's petition, posted only a couple weeks ago, hit an instant chord in Indonesia. Signatures, now merged with those of ETAN's petition, total close to 6,000, says Imam. 

"Some government spokespeople told me that Muslims are very angry at [the Jesuit Professor] Romo Suseno's letter, that this is a Muslin country and I shouldn't be supporting someone who speaks badly of us.  I told them to look at the 6,000 signatures!" Imam told me.

Among the speakers was an early ETAN activist, the Rev. Max Surjadinata, who attempted to meet with the Appeal to Conscience's president  during a recent visit to New York and deliver letters expressing opposition to the award from the GKI Yasmin and HKBP Filadelfia churches, which represent two of the more public recent examples of religious discrimination and violence in Indonesia.  Although he had been given an appointment upon phoning the Foundation, Max was rebuffed by security staff when he arrived at the door.  The guard took the letters, saying he would make sure they were delivered.

The Yasmin and Filadelfia congregations are still waiting for an answer.

Urge the Appeal to Conscience Foundation to Withdraw World Statesman Award to Indonesia's President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono

Sign the petition here

Petisi kepada Rabbi Arthur Schneier

Please e-mail us to be notified of details of any protest at the award ceremony in NYC  should the award go forward.

Urge the Appeal to Conscience Foundation to Withdraw World Statesman Award to Indonesia's President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono

Petition to Appeal to Conscience Foundation

We, the undersigned urge the Appeal to Conscience Foundation to withdraw its World Statesman Award to Indonesia's President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono. This award shocks our conscience.

On May 6 in Jakarta, a coalition of victims of religious discrimination and human rights groups in Indonesia urged the foundation to drop its plan to give the award. We support this call.

The foundation says that it works "on behalf of religious freedom and human rights throughout the world" and "promotes peace, tolerance and ethnic conflict resolution."

It is regrettable that the foundation is so ready to bestow such an award without first seriously examining the situation in the country to see if the recipient truly merits the award.

In Indonesia there is continuing religious violence, governmental inaction, and official impunity. Giving President Yudhoyono the World Statesman Award dishonors to both the foundation and mocks its recipient.

Under President Yudhoyono’s leadership, religious intolerance in Indonesia has escalated. Houses of worship have been attacked and the followers of religious minority faiths have faced discrimination, assault and worse. Police and public officials often refuse to stand up to the intolerant bullies. Sometimes they take the side of the attackers, using their office to spread bigotry and enforce discrimination.

President Yudhoyono has established an unprecedented discriminatory legal infrastructure in Indonesia. He has issued a discriminatory regulations, defended the blasphemy law at the Constitutional Court, and promulgated a decree threatening to five years in jail for anyone who “propagates” the Ahmadiyah teaching.

In recent years conflict and repression have escalated in West Papua, where its indigenous people face discrimination in their own land. At the end of April, there were at least 40 Papuan political prisoners.

Under President Yudhoyono leadership, impunity continues for past crimes against humanity and war crimes. Police and military often act with limited accountability throughout the archipelago.

Sign petition here

Background

The Appeal to Conscience Foundation plans to give the award to President Yudhoyono on May 30 in New York City.

When President Yudhoyono first took office, he promised that his administration would promote human rights and tolerance. Nine years later, the prospects for accountability for past rights violations have receded; religious intolerance has grown. Indonesia’s security forces have become increasingly abusive in West Papua. Police and soldiers who violate human rights are rarely held accountable. Serious human rights violations by members of the military are tried in military courts where soldiers, if convicted, receive light sentences.

Recent examples of religious persecution include the March 21 demolition of the HKBP Taman Sari church in Bekasi after an order from the regional government. Four Ahmadiyya places of worship were closed within a month in West Java. Last August, members of the Shia community in Sampang, East Java, wereforced from their homes members of the majority Sunni attacked them for so-called blasphemy. They continue to struggle in a makeshift camp in a sports stadium.

In 2006, President Yudhoyono issued a regulation on building houses of worship that makes it extremely difficult for religious minorities to construct their buildings. He signed a law that allows the listing of only six religions on Indonesian ID cards, basically discriminating against more than 350 other small religions. In 2009, Yudhoyono sent his cabinet members to defend the blasphemy law when it was challenged at the Constitutional Court. They mobilized Muslim militias to harass the petitioners and their lawyers. In April 2010, the Constitutional Court upheld the law, which provides criminal penalties for those who express religious beliefs that deviate from the six officially-recognized religions. The court said it is lawful to restrict minority beliefs because it allows for the “maintenance of public order.” In 2008, Yudhoyono issued an anti-Ahmadiyah decree, threatening to five years jail term for anyone who “propagates” the group’s teachings.

An ad hoc tribunal to investigate and prosecute the 1997-98 the disappearance of human rights activists has yet to be established, though it has been approved by the legislature. Yudhoyono's own coordinating minister for political, legal, and security affairs and Attorney General have rejected the official human rights commission's findings that the government's anti-Communist purges of 1965 and 1966 - which included mass killings of up to one million people, enslavement, torture, rape, and enforced disappearance - constituted a crime against humanity. The truth commission and human rights courts authorized by the 2006 law on Aceh have yet to be established. There has been no accountability for war crimes and crimes against humanity committed by Indonesian forces in Timor-Leste, where as many as 183,000 were killed, or West Papua, where an estimated 100,000 have died. 

On taking office, President Yudhoyono declared that solving the September 2004 murder of Munir Said Thalib, Indonesia’s best known human rights activist, would be a test of "whether Indonesia had changed." The President and Indonesia have failed the test.  He has refused to release the report of the fact-finding team he set up early in his Presidency. The murder involved the national intelligence agency and serving and former military officers; none of them have been brought to justice.

see alsoHuman Rights Watch, In Religions Name Abuses against Religious Minorities in Indonesia

East Timor and Indonesia Action Network (ETAN), Human Rights & Justice page

Amnesty International: Victims of the Aceh conflict still waiting for truth, justice and reparation 

Human Rights Watch Indonesia: Civilian Courts Should Try Abusive Soldiers

United States Commission on International Religious Freedom, 2013 annual report 

US Department of State: Country Reports on Human Rights Practices for 2012 - Indonesia

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Petisi kepada Rabbi Arthur Schneier

SBY bukan “World Statesman” (Negarawan Dunia) – Batalkan Penghargaan untuk Presiden Indonesia: Seruan kepada Appeal of Conscience Foundation untuk membatalkan penganugerahan World Statesman Award.

Petisi oleh: East Timor and Indonesia Action Network

Ketika Presiden Yudhoyon pertama kali menjabat, ia berjanji bahwa pemerintahannya akan memajukan hak-hak asasi manusia dan meningkatkan toleransi. Sembilan tahun kemudian, tidak ada pertanggungjawaban atas pelanggaran hak-hak asasi di masa lalu; intoleransi agama malah meningkat. 

Kekuatan bersenjata Indonesia menjadi semakin sewenang-wenang di Papua. Polisi dan tentara yang melakukan pelanggaran hak-hak asasi manusia jarang sekali harus mempertanggungjawabkan perbuatannya. Pelanggaran berat hak-hak asasi manusia yang dilakukan oleh anggota militer diadili di pengadilan militer dimana tentara pada umumnya mendapat hukuman yang sangat ringan.

Catatan ini membuat Presiden Yudhoyono tidak pantas mendapat anugerah dari sebuah organisasi yang mendukung toleransi agama dan penegakan hak-hak asasi manusia.

Lihat selengkapnya disini: http://www.etan.org/action/action2/sby_award.htm

Sebuah aksi unjuk rasa (demonstrasi) akan diadakan pada tanggal 30 Mei di New York City jika pemberian penghargaan ini tidak dibatalkan. Lebih lanjut, silahkan kontak: etan@etan.org.

Kepada Yth.

Rabbi Arthur Schneier, President, Appeal to Conscience Foundation

Seruan kepada Conscience Foundation untuk membatalkan penganugerahan World Statesman Award

Kami, yang bertandatangan di bawah ini menyerukan kepada Appeal to Conscience Foundation (selanjutnya A of C Foundation)  untuk membatalkan pemberian penghargaan World Statesman Awardkepada Presiden Indonesia President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono. Pemberian penghargaan ini mengguncangkan hati nurani (conscience) kami. Pada tanggal 6 Mei di Jakarta, sebuah koalisi korban-korban diskriminasi agama dan kelompok-kelompok hak-hak asasi manusia di Indonesia telah menyerukan kepada A of C Foundation untuk membatalkan rencananya memberikan penghargaan ini. Kami mendukung seruan mereka.

A of C Foundation menyebutkan bahwa ia berjuang “untuk kebebasan beragama dan hak-hak asasi manusia di seluruh dunia” dan “memajukan perdamaian, toleransi dan penyelesaian konflik etnik.”

Sangatlah disayangkan bahwa A of C Foundation telah terburu-buru memberikan penghargaan ini tanpa sebelumnya menyelidiki keadaan di dalam negeri Indonesia untuk melihat apakah penerimanya sungguh-sungguh layak untuk mendapatkan penghargaan.

Kekerasan atas nama agama terus berlanjut di Indonesia, pemerintahnya berdiam diri, dan impunitas menjadi kebijakan resmi. Memberikan World Statesman Award kepada Presiden Yudhoyono sama dengan merendahkan martabat A of C Foundation dan mengolok-olok penerima-penerima lainnya.

Di bawah kepemimpinan Presiden Yudhoyono, intolerasni agama di Indonesia meningkat dengan pesat. Rumah-rumah ibadah diserang dan para pengikut agama-agama minoritas menghadapi diskriminasi, penyerangan, dan banyak hal yang lebih buruk lagi. Polisi dan pejabat-pejabat publik seringkali tidak mau menghadapi pihak-pihak penyerang. Seringkali mereka justru memihak para penyerang, dan menggunakan jabatan-jabatan mereka untuk menyebarkan fanatisme dan melakukan diskriminasi. 

Presiden Yudhoyono telah menciptakan infrastruktur hukum yang diskriminatif di Indonesia. Dia telah mengeluarkan berbagai aturan yang diskriminatif, mempertahankan UU tentang penodaan  agama di Mahkamah Konstitusional, dan membuat peraturan yang memberikan hukuman selama lima tahun penjara kepada siapa saja yang menyebarkan ajaran Ahmadiyah.

Dalam beberapa tahun belakangan ini, konflik dan penindasan telah meningkat di Papua Barat, dimana penduduk aslinya menghadapi diskriminasi di tanah mereka sendiri. Pada akhir bulan April, setidaknya terdapat 40 orang tahanan politik di Papua.

Di bawah kepemimpinan Presiden Yudhoyono, impunitas terus berlanjut bagi kejahatan-kejahatan terhadap kemanusiaan di masa lalu. Polisi dan militer seringkali bertindak dengan tanpa tanggungjawab di seluruh negeri kepulauan ini.

Dengan segala hormat,

Sign petition here