The pain of disrespect - Page 2
From Griffith REVIEW Edition 9: Up North
© Copyright Griffith University & the author.
Written by Dewi Anggraeni
WE SHOULD BE ABLE, HOWEVER, TO DIFFERENTIATE THE GOVERNMENT'S STANCE from the more informed attitudes of Australian people. After all, many Australians have travelled to Indonesia and have made friends, or at least acquaintances, with Indonesians. There is no doubt that links at the grassroots level exist. It is a pity that studies of Indonesia and other countries in Asia have not received sustained support from this government.
Funding cuts to Asian studies departments in universities throughout the country over the past decade have seen an alarming decline in the number of students studying and those teaching Indonesian language and culture. Jamie Mackie, founding professor of Indonesian Studies in the [I mean Indonesian Studies across the disciplines, because when Mackie founded the studies RSPAS had not been founded] Australian National University, recently warned that the decline in Indonesian language teaching threatened the sustainability of Australian analytical capacities on matters Indonesian.
It is a fact that most Australians know very little about Indonesia. They know it is the most populous country in the region and that it invaded East Timor. And post-Bali, they know that Indonesians are mostly Muslim. That it is a sovereign nation that has embarked on the slow process of democratisation after three decades of oppressive government seems immaterial.
Fortunately, Indonesia is a market for Australian export and offers potential cheap labour for Australia's offshore manufacturers if the ingrained corruption does not make it too unpredictable for safe investment. This makes Indonesia an economic issue, putting it in Australia's business agenda, and draws the attention of social-political experts. As a result, there are people in Australia genuinely interested in Indonesia, although they are in the minority.
The majority is invariably drawn to events where Australians are involved, such as the arrest and trial Schapelle Corby. Callers to talkback radio programs and bloggers online called for, among other things: Australian Government intervention in demanding Corby's release; for Australian holiday-makers to look elsewhere unless Corby was released; to cut diplomatic ties with Indonesia; to stop any aid going to Indonesia to show our displeasure. Malcolm T. Elliott behind the microphone at 2GB was most explicit:
Elliott: The judges don't even speak English, mate, they're straight out of the trees, if you excuse my expression.
Caller: Don't you think that disrespects the whole of our neighbouring nation?
Elliott: I have total disrespect for our neighbouring nation, my friend. Total disrespect ... And then we get this joke of a trial, and it's nothing more than a joke. An absolute joke the way they sit there. And they do look like the three wise monkeys, I'll say it. They don't speak English, they read books, they don't listen to her. They show us absolutely no respect, those judges.
Letters to editors of broadsheet newspapers were not much more civil or informed, littered with words like "kangaroo court", "barbaric" and "human rights abuse". One reminded the editor and readers, "after all we have given to that country after the tsunami tragedy", adding that the law was outdated and inhumane, "considering that convicted terrorist Abu Bakar Bashir has only been sentenced to two years and six months' jail (with the prospect of appeal) for his proven (sic) ‘conspiracy' participation in the Bali bombings that killed 202 people in the same country ..."
The Indonesian consulate general in Perth received an anonymous letter containing two bullets, with a message, "If Schapelle Corby is not released immediately, you will get these in your brains. Indonesians go home!"
The fuzzy feeling I felt after witnessing the generosity of Australians toward the tsunami victims dissipated under the cascade of events and reaction. Apart from straight grants, the bulk of Australian aid to Indonesia is in the form of soft loans to fund projects that are contracted to Australian businesses. To arrest the flow of aid would effectively deprive Australian entrepreneurs of business. To bring up Australians' donations to the tsunami tragedy cheapened the worthy gesture, causing it to quickly discolour and turn into something somewhat mercenary. I was, therefore, hugely relieved to read subsequent letters whose writers expressed the same embarrassment I felt.
The reference to "proven ‘conspiracy' participation in the Bali bombings" suggested a complete disregard for another legal system. Proven by whom? By the letter writer?
The Indonesian Government was at pains to prove Abu Bakar Bashir guilty of the bombing conspiracy. Paradoxically, the new-found demoracy and media transparency prevented it from interfering in the legal proceedings the way the defeated New Order government had done in the past. Indonesian courts, from local to high courts, are going through a reform, old judges who had learnt to rubber-stamp the Government's directives are progressively being pensioned off and replaced by younger, more idealistic and democratic-thinking judges.
In October 2002, shortly after the Bali bombing, then-president Megawati, after intense diplomatic pressure from the US and Australia, issued a special presidential decree enacting draconian new anti-terrorism measures, including the provision for lengthy police detention without trial. Bashir, and the other bombers, were arraigned and detained using this new law. The following month, the Indonesian National Police achieved a record-breaking breakthrough in the Bali bombing case and the main perpetrators fell one by one into the net. They were then sentenced to death, except Ali Imron, who had shown remorse and helped with police investigations, who was sentenced to life imprisonment. The record-breaking trials and sentencing used the new anti-terror law retrospectively and this was later contested by the defence team as unconstitutional, giving the judges of the newly established Constitutional Court a massive headache. No judge, politician or any socially and political aware person in Indonesia wants to see the main perpetrators of the Bali bombing go free because of a technicality overlooked in the excitement of administering justice.
While this problem was still being hotly debated, the court was having problems finding sufficient evidence to prove Ba'ashir, as the spiritual leader of Jama'ah Islamiyah, was involved in the planning of the bombings in Bali and the Marriott Hotel in Jakarta. Witnesses were produced, although none was able or prepared to testify first-hand, that Bashir was the leader of the now banned Jama'ah Islamiyah, or that he had masterminded or "given his blessings" to the bombings.
The first person who had allegedly declared that Bashir was the leader of Jama'ah Islamiyah was Omar Al-Farouq, a mysterious individual with multiple identities living in Indonesia for some unknown time. He was arrested on June 5, 2002, in mysterious circumstances, and passed on to the CIA. Despite repeated requests by the Indonesian court, the US refused to allow Al-Farouq to be interviewed, let alone travel to Indonesia and give evidence. The other significant person believed to be able to help with the prosecution, was Hambali, a high-ranking Jama'ah Islamiyah operative caught in Thailand in August 2003 and taken immediately to the US. Hambali, also, was not produced to testify at Bashir's trial. The court was thus unable to prove that Bashir was involved in planning the bombings, as he and his defence team consistently said.
On March 3, 2005, Bashir was sentenced to 30 months' imprisonment, but acquitted of more serious charges of ordering the bombings in Bali in October 2002 and at the Marriott Hotel in Jakarta in August 2003. Tim Lindsey, director of Melbourne University's Asian Law Centre, wrote at the time, "Given the weak case against him, that Bashir was convicted at all indicates how desperate the Indonesian authorities were to nail him."
However, the US and Australian governments immediately criticised the sentence. US Embassy official Max Kwak said, "Given the gravity of the charges on which he was convicted, we're disappointed at the length of the sentence"; Australia's Alexander Downer told reporters he had instructed the Australian ambassador to explain to Indonesian officials why the sentence was too light. Even Opposition Leader Kim Beazley said Bashir should spend the rest of his miserable life in jail. Angry callers to talkback radio programs, letters to the editors, and the occasional blogger also echoed the dissatisfaction.
Indonesians who did not like the outcome, but were aware of the circumstances, despaired at the patronising attitudes of Australians. If the case presented by the prosecutors would not be sustained in other countries' courts, why should it in Indonesia? And more importantly, why should the US expect a harsher sentence when it refused to produce the key witnesses?
Just when people in Indonesia were beginning to put that hurt behind them, the Schapelle Corby case pushed it to the fore. Right from the beginning of the trial, comments from Australians believe that they could sway the court. If the response to the Corby case happened in isolation, it might have been interpreted as Australians feeling protective toward a compatriot in trouble in a foreign country. However, being so close in time to the outrage to Bashir's "light sentence", it was impossible to miss the irony of the demand that Corby be set free even while the case was under way.
Many Australians, even fairly educated ones, tend to assume that because Indonesia does not have a jury system, its legal system is flawed. Indonesia inherited the Civil Law tradition sans juries from the French, via the Dutch, which colonised Indonesia for more than 300 years. The absence of juries is a feature of the European legal system, which has served many countries well.
The system is not the issue, but the fact that during the New Order government, bribery and government intervention were common in Indonesian courts. Unfortunately, they are still not yet uncommon. However, bribery and government intervention in the court proceedings can no longer happen with impunity. Indonesian newspapers and news magazines now routinely expose corrupt officials regardless of rank. Undoing institutionalised corruption in a country where court officials are poorly paid, however, is not easy. Even the most patriotic Indonesians are only too aware of this and, understandably, quick to become defensive.
Fortunately, in Corby's case, instead of making patronising remarks, Australia's government officials have been sensible, publicly saying that Australia cannot interfere in another country's legal system. And furthermore, both Australia and Indonesia have behaved a great deal more effectively by negotiating a prisoner-exchange agreement.
OVER THE YEARS I HAVE LIVED IN AUSTRALIA, I have learned that most Caucasian Australians do not consciously behave with superiority in relation to Indonesia and other Asian neighbours, they just know that European and British cultures are superior, and those who don't regard themselves as "racists", feel "burdened" to help Asians and other non-whites. Those who are not "burdened" speak openly about the inferior quality of anything not derived from Europe and USA. A minority, thank God for their existence, are aware of the need for better mutual understanding.
I know that Indonesians cannot help being defensive about their country, especially when facing a pontificating Caucasian finger. What makes them different from their forefathers is that today's Indonesians feel defensive as well as resentful. They are increasingly aware that they are not inferior to their Caucasian counterparts, but are inevitably identified with the corruption in their country and little else. This resentment often drives them to seek the most negative aspects about the offending Caucasians and point them out, causing mutual aggression. Australians who try to draw the attention of their Indonesian counterparts to human rights violations in some parts of the country for instance, often hear about what has been, and is being, done to the Aborigines.
An awareness of this complexity was in my mind when I was asked by the young MC at the fund-raising cultural performance about what they should say. I wanted them to emphasise the link of youth, because I believe that if we start to know each other naturally when we are young, there is more chance of our learning about each other with the least prejudice. ♦