22.Ganti Nama, the compulsory name change imposed on Chinese Indonesian citizens and other racial laws and legal action in Indonesia |
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Introduction |
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With this story I will make an attempt to reduce the non-awareness and ignorance about the hardship of the Chinese citizens in Indonesia. This non-awareness or was it ignorance? became apparent for example when within the framework of the coup of 1965 I asked an expert on modern Indonesian history in Leiden why he during this meeting at his institute, was just passively listening and did not raise the issue of the harsh ill-fate of Chinese citizens after this coup. The only answer I received was: It was not about the Chinese. |
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Discrimination of Chinese Citizens and discriminating laws and regulations in Indonesia |
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The compulsory name change imposed on the Chinese citizens in Indonesia were to be seen in the context of a set of discriminating laws and regulations introduced in Indonesia since the proclamation of independence on the 17th of August 1945. |
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On September the 20th 1945 H.H. Kan was invited by president Soekarno to his home Pegangsaan Timoer 56, the very same place where he had pronounced the declaration of independent of Indonesia just a month before.
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Luckily according to letters from the families Han and The, from Surabaya to H.H. Kan, that the family members had largely been spared from the pogroms at that time (1946). |
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Since H.H. Kan was still concerned about the fate of the Chinese citizens in the new Indonesia, he wrote telegrams to the queen of the Netherlands and the prime minister in 1946 and 1947. |
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These telegrams to the queen and the prime minister were clearly comprehensive telegrams. For example this one, as can be seen from the receipt contained 265 words and had cost f 80.50. |
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Examples of the answers to his telegrams were: |
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In resume: the results of his telegram would be incorporated in the Lingadjati agreement. |
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On my mothers identity cards from 1966 and 1969 clearly the letter A can be seen behind the number. |
The first discriminating regulation launched by the Indonesian government was directly after the transfer of sovereignty to Indonesia in 1949. |
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The Chinese embassy tried to relieve the Chinese citizens. |
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H.H. Kan was jailed because on the raid they found a revolver for which he had no permit. |
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This permit was issued to allow H.H. Kan to travel around safely in his car in West Java
According to my father this stay in jail was really disastrous for my grandfathers health, in particular the overcrowded cell in combination with bad or lack of food. Nota bene my grandfather had just survived the ordeal of the Japanese camps. |
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The police of Djakarta refused to chase the Pakistani away under the pretext that Pakistan was a friendly Muslim state. (see the story: The last house of H.H. Kan) |
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In 1954 there was a law forbidding Chinese to buy land property, (except real estate in urban areas) |
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In 1967: Instruksi Presidium Kabinet RI (IPKRI) no. 37/U/IN/6/1967: |
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The special A code was used to easily call all Chinese citizens to report to the police station (just like the J for the Jewish). So they could be checked on the whereabouts and their involvement with the communist coup. If you did not respond in time to the call up then you were supposed to be a fugitive communist and so could be taken from home. In 1988: SE 02/SE/DITJEN/PPGK 1988: Just in 2017 I received from Indonesia via the newsletter of Tionghoa INFO information about an Government Institution during the Orde Baru regime that was founded to coordinate |
This Government Institution: “Badan Penyelesaian Masalah Cina” (Institution for resolving the Chinese Problem) worked according to a Handbook published in 1979 by BAKIN (Badan Koordinasi Intelijen Negara). Inside there was a mark that the use of this handbook was “limited to functionaries”, so not for public use. Now after more than 40 years such documents become open to the public. |
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Years ago as I read about this Institution in Wikipedia, my thought was then: this is nonsense, communistic propaganda that should be deleted from Wikipedia. After seeing the above photos and reading a description of the content I became convinced that the Suharto regime had copied the notes of the Wannsee Conference of Nazi Germany and just interchanged the word Jew with Chinese The plans for the Chinese were just the same as for the Jews namely to drive away the Chinese from Indonesia. The roadmap was identical as described in the notes of the Wannsee Conference for the Jews. |
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The First Phase:
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The Second Phase:Annihilation of the Chinese
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Just during the period of government of the first chosen president K.H. Abdurrachman Wahid (Gus Dur) some of the discriminating laws of the Suharto regime were withdrawn | ||
Translation: |
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In 2000: suspending Inpres no. 14/1967 replaced by Keppres no. 6/2000: |
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Epilogue |
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Discrimination and discriminating regulations and laws for Chinese in Indonesia have been there all the time. This is clearly a violation of the declaration of universal human rights of the United Nations (also signed by Indonesia) and also explicitly mentioned in the constitution of the Republic of Indonesia.
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Before WO II, the Dutch East Indian government stimulated racism against the Chinese population by the Indonesian population like the Javanese ones. An example can be read in this newspaper article in which my grandfather H.H. Kan in 1930 addressed questions in the Volksraad to the government.
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Chinese in Indonesia nowadays are still not accepted as real Indonesian. From a recent article in the newspaper Algemeen Dagblad of August the 21th 2018 it became apparent that also Buddhist Chinese Indonesian citizens were discriminated and attacked. So a Chinese Indonesian women was sentenced to 1 ½ year imprisonment just because she had dared to complain about noise disturbance of the neighbouring mosque. According to a local newspaper the Jakarta Post, the court in Indonesia had put in their judgment that the 44 year old woman was guilty of blasphemy. The woman from North Sumatra was complaining about the prayer calls of the local mosque. In 2016 she would have said that the prayer calls were “too loud”, hurting her ears. Therefore she had asked to lower the volume of the loudspeakers. The news about her criticism on the local mosque was according to the Jakarta Post the trigger for attacks on temples and vandalism of Buddha statues. The police arrested 19 hooligans. They were sentenced to 1 to 4 months of imprisonment. Thus under the pretext of blasphemy both Christian and Buddhist Chinese Indonesian citizens were suppressed and put in jail.. The 2 examples above demonstrate how anno 2018 Chinese citizens are discriminated with racist legal actions. Sioe Yao Kan, Berkel Last updated September 2018 |
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References |
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Wikipedia: Indonesian laws affecting Chinese Indonesians. TEMPO; Jejak CIA Pada Tragedi 1965; 5-11 oktober 2015. Algemeen Dagblad; Buitenlandredactie 21-08-2018. |
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