The Indonesian government’s last minute decision to have one of its diplomats attend the Nobel Peace Prize ceremony in Oslo, notwithstanding the vehement opposition of China, is to be applauded.
It is, of course, understandable that Indonesia would be reluctant to antagonize a major investor and trade partner like China. This reluctance is clearly evident in the vacillation shown by the foreign minister over whether or not Indonesia would be represented at the Oslo ceremony and the ultimate sending of someone of lesser rank than the Indonesian ambassador.
Nevertheless, in the end, the Indonesian government apparently determined that investment and trade considerations should not be allowed to dominate higher order values such as Indonesia’s right, as a sovereign nation, to be represented at whatever international forums it wants and without succumbing to pressure from other countries.
Hopefully, the Indonesian government’s decision also reflected a realization that it would be hardly consistent with this country’s status as an emerging democracy, where human rights are, at least sometimes, respected, to boycott the world’s premier peace and human rights event simply because the person to be honored is regarded as a trouble maker by his own country.
Indonesia’s own history is replete with numerous examples of people who were initially regarded as dissidents and trouble makers by the authorities of the day only to subsequently become national heroes — Sukarno and Hatta, as the founding fathers of the Indonesian Republic, being just two examples.
Had Indonesia succumbed to Chinese pressure, it would have found itself lumped in the same invidious category as patently repressive regimes such as Saudi Arabia, Egypt Afghanistan, Iran, Cuba and Sudan — scarcely great or inspiring role models for the new Indonesian democracy.
The Indonesian government might also have had pause for thought when it realized that the last time a Nobel Peace Prize laureate was prevented by his own country from attending the award ceremony was 1935 when the German peace activist Count Carl von Ossietzky, languishing in a Nazi concentration camp, was unable to attend his own award ceremony. Again, not a very laudable precedent for a modern day would be democracy to be seen to be supporting.
Assuming it was not just nationalism alone that ultimately motivated the Indonesian government to ensure it was represented at the Oslo ceremony, its decision is an encouraging sign for the further development of a democratic tradition in Indonesia. Certainly, the making of difficult but morally correct decisions like this, says far more about the Indonesian government’s real commitment to democracy and human rights than the usual platitudes one grows accustomed to hearing from Indonesia’s professional politicians. This is definitely a good news story for Indonesia.
William A. Sullivan
Jakarta
