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Activist renews call for Dutch accountability over colonial atrocities
KUKB chair Jeffry Pondaag has urged the administration of President Prabowo Subianto to take a firm stance on postindependence atrocities committed by Dutch forces ahead of Indonesia's 80th independence anniversary this year.
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President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo (left) gestures on Oct. 7, 2019, while speaking with Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte in the gardens of Bogor Palace in West Java. (Reuters/Willy Kurniawan)
Nur Janti
The Jakarta Post/Jakarta
As Indonesia prepares to mark 80 years of independence this August, an activist has renewed a call for the government to take a firm stance on holding the Netherlands accountable for the past atrocities it committed during the colonial era.
"For 80 years, the Dutch did not recognize Aug. 17, 1945, as Indonesia's independence [day]. This is an insult," Jeffry Pondaag, chairman of the Netherlands-based Committee of Dutch Honorary Debts (KUKB), said April 15.
Addressing a parliamentary meeting in The Hague in 2023, then-Dutch prime minister Mark Rutte said the Netherlands had "completely and unconditionally" acknowledged 1945 as the actual year of Indonesian independence, though he added this would not "change any existing legal grounds".
Rutte's office immediately retracted the statement, saying the Netherlands still referred to 1949 as the year marking the official transfer of sovereignty.
"I want justice and fairness. Why should we pay 4.5 billion [guilders] for a war [the Dutch initiated]? We didn't ask for war, so why should we pay?" Jeffry said.
