Adi Mawardi, Surabaya – Scores of students from a various groups in the East Java provincial capital of Surabaya held actions at the State Grahadi Building on Wednesday October 20. They were calling for a government which is clean, free from corruption, collusion and nepotism along with one which will uphold the supremacy of law.
The demonstrations were held in waves. At the first demonstration which started at around 9.40am, scores of students from the Indonesian Muslim Student Action Front (KAMMI) moved off from the Jalan Pemuda and Jalan Gubernur Suryo intersection carrying KAMMI placards. An hour later students from the National Student League for Democracy (LMND) moved off carrying banners and scores of posters.
As well as bringing scores of posters and the like the KAMMI students wore masks of newly inaugurated President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono (SBY) and Vice-president Jusuf Kalla and covered their faces with cardboard on which was written “SBY-Kalla keep your promises” and “Pro-IMF cabinet, no way” which ending with large question marks.
The chairperson of KAMMI Surabaya, Agus Wahyu Dwianto, explained that the students were demanding that in the first 100 days of government SBY-Kalla must be able to form a clean and decisive government.
The indications which would demonstrate such a government would be not involving questionable individuals who have been involved in corruption and the illegal use of state funds such as the Bank Indonesia Bank Liquidity program and other cases. In additional to the this the future cabinet should not filled with neocolonialist and neoliberal lackeys who are pro- the International Monetary Fund, the Consultative Group on Indonesia and the World Bank.
In addition to this that also called for the upholding of civilian supremacy by abolishing the developmental and territorial functions of the TNI (armed forces)1. They supported efforts at national reconciliation which have been proposed by SBY-Kalla. “But this does not mean amnesty for perpetrators of corruption during the period of the New Order [regime of former President Suharto] and the neo-New Order. Reconciliation after upholding the supremacy of law”, they asserted.
The LMND students meanwhile arrived several minutes after KAMMI had dispersed. They made four demands calling for a government which is clean, democratic, independent and pro-people. The action caused a traffic jam which spread to Jalan Tunjungan and Gubernur Suryo and only returned to normal after demonstrators disbanded at 12.15pm.
Notes:
1. The TNI’s territorial command structure mandates the deployment of military command posts and detachments at all levels of the civil administration: provincial, district, sub- district and village. This structure provides the organisational framework for the TNI to act as a political security force at all levels of society.
[Translated by James Balowski.]
