Bayu Ardi Isnanto, Solo – President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo attended the keynote event of the Pancasila Youth’s (PP) 58th anniversary in the Central Java city of Solo. The president was given the opportunity to present his greetings and close the event.
Speaking before hundreds of PP leaders and members, Widodo said that the PP is special social organisation (ormas). His remarks were greeted by applause from all of the PP members.
“The Pancasila Youth is a special ormas because its name has the word Pancasila. Namely our nation’s ideology, the Indonesian nation, our guiding path for 72 years, an ideology that unites our diverse nation”, said Widodo at the Sunan Hotel on Saturday October 28.
Bearing this special name in mind, Widodo reminded all PP members to continue to safeguard Pancasila. The president also said that he hopes that the PP can be a bulwark of the state ideology.
“So I hope that the Pancasila Youth will always be a bulwark of Pancasila, a bulwark of the UUD 1945 [1945 Constitution], the NKRI [Unitary State of the Republic of Indonesia] and Bhinneka Tunggal Ika [Unity in Diversity]”, he said.
Not forgetting, the former Surakarta (Solo) mayor also congratulated the PP on its 58th university and invited the PP members to join in mutual cooperation to build the country.
“On the Pancasila Youth’s 58th anniversary, let us continue to mutually cooperate with the government, with Indonesia’s young men and women to become a generation that is strong, resilient and heading towards Indonesia’s golden era”, said Widodo. (bgs/bgs)
Notes
Pemuda Pancasila (Pancasila Youth) was established by the army in October 1959, ostensibly to uphold the state ideology of Pancasila. During the anti-communist purge in 1965-66 the group took an active part in the slaughter of Indonesian Communist Party (PKI) members and sympathisers. Under the New Order dictatorship of former president Suharto the organisation became an association of notorious thugs and petty criminals who carried out dirty work on behalf of the regime. The organisation still has close ties with various factions of the military and police and has been linked to criminal activities such as racketeering and extortion. In recent years has been involved in a number of violent turf wars with other vigilante groups and attacks on leftist groups and events that it deems to be “pro-communist” or “anti-Pancasila”.
[Translated by James Balowski. The original title of the article was Jokowi Sebut Pemuda Pancasila Ormas yang Spesial.]
