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Visitors pack Nasution Museum on anniversary of 1965 kidnapping attempt
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A soldier speaks to visitors to the General Dr Abdul Haris Nasution Museum in Jakarta on Sept.30. (Antara/Wahyu Putro A.)
J
akarta resident Hanifa, 37, swiped sweat from her son’s forehead as they left the General Dr. Abdul Haris (AH) Nasution Museum on Jl. Teuku Umar, Central Jakarta, on Saturday.
“This is the first time for us to visit the museum. There are no fans inside. I didn’t expect there would be a lot of people here. My son got cranky because of the heat,” Hanifa smiled as she fanned her 8-year-old boy.
Hanifa said she had decided to bring her two children to the museum after she watched Pengkhianatan G 30 S PKI (Treachery of G30S/PKI), the movie on the coup attempt perpetrated by the Indonesian Communist Party (PKI) in 1965, aired on a private TV station on Friday.
Through the visit, Hanifa said, she could give them an early education about the dangers of communism in Indonesia in past years.
“I want them to know how harmful the PKI was to Nasution and this nation overall. So, they will have different perspectives from what they’ve seen all this time,” she added.
The museum was once owned by Nasution’s family. The Army general managed to escape a kidnapping attempt perpetrated by the PKI on the night of Sept.30, 1965, but his daughter Ade Irma Suryani Nasution was shot dead.
Pictures of the Nasution family are placed on the walls around the house. Statues of Cakrabirawa soldiers and Nasution and his family members were erected inside the museum to resemble the abduction attempt that occurred 52 years ago. The museum closes at 4 p.m. every day. (ebf)
