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Reform undone: Activists lament shrinking civic space, unresolved rights abuse
Indonesia’s democracy has gone backward since Reform, pushing the democratic values students and the public fought for during the fall of the New Order in May 1998 increasingly out of reach, according to Amnesty International Indonesia executive director Usman Hamid.
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Protesters hold banner reading “The highest sovereignty is in the people's hands“ during a protest in Jakarta on May 21, 2024 to commemorate the 26th anniversary of the start of the Reform Era. (Antara/Akbar Nugroho Gumay)
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wenty-six years after the Reform Era that marked the fall of former president Soeharto, rights groups have lamented a regression in the country’s democracy and civil liberties, highlighting the recent forceful disbandment of public discussions as evidence of the shrinking of civic space.
Indonesia’s democracy has gone backward since Reform, pushing the democratic values students and the public fought for during the fall of the New Order in May 1998 increasingly out of reach, according to Amnesty International Indonesia executive director Usman Hamid.
He pointed to the forceful disbandment of the People’s Water Forum, a counter-forum to the government-hosted 10th World Water Forum, by a group of people calling themselves as Patriot Garuda Nusantara (Garuda Nusantara Patriots) in Denpasar, Bali on Monday. The People’s Water Forum was organized by a group of NGOs to advocate equal access to clean water and voice against privatization and commercialization of water resources.
“It was not the first time that intimidation or violence occurred on the sidelines of an international forum. This proves that the state is not serious in protecting civil liberties,” Usman said in a statement on Tuesday.
According to Amnesty, video footage showed Patriot Garuda Nusantara destroying banners and billboards of People’s Water Forum and physically attacking participants of the discussion.
"When we had just finished with our first day discussion on Monday afternoon, these people suddenly came, shouting and demanding us to stop the event,” I Nyoman Mardika, one of the organizers of the discussion, told The Jakarta Post on Wednesday.
“They said that Bali's acting governor has banned the hosting of this kind of event while the World Water Forum is underway.”
