Denisa Tristianty, Jakarta – Hundreds of Indonesian women, who took part in the 2019 Women’s March in Jakarta, began the action by gathering at the Sari Pan Pasific Hotel on Jl. Thamrin in Central Jakarta on the morning of Saturday April 27.
The protesters, who had been arriving since 7 am, then held a relaxed long-march towards the nearby National Monument. What then were the demands that they wanted to articulate?
In a speech from atop of the command vehicle using a megaphone, Women’s Legal Aid Foundation (LBH Apik) member Dinov said that the politics of Indonesian women is the politics of anti-SARA – ethnic, religious, racial and inter-group inspired conflicts – or identity politics.
Ririn Kasani from the Partnership for Governance Reform (Kemitraan) meanwhile articulated the need for protection from sexual violence. “Protecting our children from sexual violence, women become the victims of violence, ratify the sexual violence law”, said Kasani, referring to the Draft Law on the Elimination of Sexual Violence (RUU PKS).
Titi Anggraini, the director of the Association for Elections and Democracy (Perludem) election monitoring group, also took part in the event and was seen arriving at 7.55 am and was immediately invited to climb onto the command vehicle and give a speech.
Anggraini spoke about the importance of women in the establishment of political parties (parpol). “Political parties are not able to become parpol because of what? If there are no women”, said Anggraini, which was greeted by shouts and cheers from the Women’s March protesters.
Related to the requirements for a political party to take part in elections (pemilu), Anggraini said that women legislative candidates (caleg) have the same rights as men in being given good rankings on candidate lists in the legislative elections.
“Women are only given a ranking of 4 in their dapil [electoral districts]. Yet the requirement for a parpol to take part in the pemilu is a 30 percent quota of women caleg”, said Anggraini.
[Translated by James Balowski. Edited slightly for readability. The original title of the article was “Women’s March Jakarta 2019 Serukan Politik Perempuan Tanpa SARA”.]
