"As men, as the heads of our families, we must re-assert our leading roles!" The hoarse voice echoed against blaring dangdut music in the yard of the Sungai Bambu subdistrict office in North Jakarta recently.
What seemed like a cry for the battle of the sexes was in fact a call to arms for all men in the neighborhood to join the country's family planning scheme, which has been in tatters since the fall of Soeharto, one of its main proponents.
City family planning officers are currently targeting the male population to participate in the revitalization of the program, especially through the promotion of vasectomies.
The Bahari Association, Sungai Bambu's gathering of male family planning participants won an award for the best group in the city.
"The rating was based on the number of male participants," Hendri Nofrizal, head of the city's family planning and reproductive health division, told The Jakarta Post. He added the neighborhood's number of male participants has succeeded in surpassing the target of 4.3 percent out of the number of couples in the area in the reproductive age bracket.
Hendri added the city's family planning program was targeting all couples of a reproductive age, to join the program as soon as they had two children.
"Currently, we have only been able to reach 71 percent of the target, with 3.9 percent of that figure representing male participants," he explained.
According to Hendri, the number of male participants in Sungai Bambu has reached 4.9 percent.
The success was largely due to the man-to-man vasectomy campaigns, Suwarmin, head of the Bahari Association, said.
"When we play chess or drink coffee with other men in the neighborhood, we tell them about the benefits of the operation," Suwarmin said, "We also helped those who are interested get access to free services, such as this one," he pointed to a parked bus-cum-operating room.
Inside the medium sized operating unit, doctors were performing a vasectomy on a man in his twenties. The man lay placidly as they conversed about the difficulties in providing the operation and their reluctance to perform vasectomies outside Jakarta.
The bus was part of the city's family planning campaign, which included free consultation and medical services for participants.
Rahim, the fiery orator who called for a reclamation of male leadership roles, was addressing 20 men waiting for their turn to have a vasectomy in the mobile bus unit.
He told them about the positive effects of the operation, and assured the men the operation would not affect their virility.
The country's family planning program, especially during the 1980s, predominately encouraged women to use contraception, despite the fact that some women suffered from using certain methods, or that such methods were often ineffective.
Most Indonesian men regard family planning as a woman's responsibility. This, coupled with limited information about male contraceptive measures, such as vasectomies, has made family planning less attractive to men.
However, the government is beginning to shift such views through education and the provision of free services. The Bahari Association, for example, is attempting to paint family planning in a more masculine and patriarchal light.
Way, a father in his late 40s, who was waiting for his turn, considered the operation the most sensible choice.
"I already have four children, and they are very expensive," he said, adding that he worked as a laborer in a nearby port and hardly earned enough money to support his family.
Way said that having a vasectomy would be much more effective than contraceptive measures used by his wife. "My wife tried all kinds of contraception, but there's always something wrong and she always stopped using them at one point or another." He agreed with Rahim that men should become more involved in family planning. "You really have to leave it to the men to get things done," he said, with a confident smile. (dis)
