AI urges I'nesia to address rights abuses
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Human rights group Amnesty International yesterday urged Indonesia's next president to show a commitment to human rights.
The election will be held tomorrow between Jakarta Governor JokoWidodo and former general Prabowo Subianto, who has a checkered human rights record.
“The country’s next leader must address a range of issues – from a growing crackdown on freedom of expression, discrimination and attacks against religious minorities, to the rights of women and girls,” said Josef Benedict, Amnesty’s Indonesia campaigner.
“It is also time for a new Indonesian leader who has the courage to deal with past human rights violations including unlawful killings,torture and enforced disappearances committed during the Suharto era and the reform period,” he said.
Prabowo has admitted to his role in the kidnappings of dissidents during the last months of dictator Suharto’s rule, which ended in 1998.
Allan Nairn, a US-based investigative journalist, alleged that the army special forces, known as Kopassus, and the state intelligence agency are involved in a covert operation to influence the presidential election.
Nairn, citing what he described as sources involved in the operation, wrote on the weekend that Kopassus operatives met last week at their headquarters to discuss a strategy to put Prabowo in office.
President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono posted a video on YouTube on Saturday to urge the military and police to remain neutral in the election.
“If people see members of the police and military act partially, please report them to the authorities,” Yudhoyono said in a video message posted on YouTube on Sunday.
Active members of the military and the police are not eligible to vote under Indonesia's electoral law. Prabowo was a Kopassus commander from 1996-98. He served briefly as the head of the Army Strategic Reserves Command in 1998 before being dismissed from the military for his role in the kidnappings.
Recent polls suggest the race between Joko, 53, and Prabowo, 62, will be close, although Joko had led by as much as 30 per cent in polls earlier in the year.
Yudhoyono’s Democratic Party last week announced that it had decided to throw its support behind Prabowo, after initially saying that it would remain neutral.
“Mr Prabowo and Mr Jokowi must be ready to accept defeat,” Yudhoyonos aid in the video. “The elections are held every five years and they can always compete again,” he said.
Prabowo has been nominated by his Great Indonesia MovementParty (Gerindra) and five other parties. Joko is backed by the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle, which won the April 9 legislative elections, and three other smaller parties.
Styling himself as a robust and decisive leader, Prabowo uses nationalist rhetoric and invokes his military background to appeal to voters.
He has vowed to protect the country’s natural resources from being exploited by foreign companies, and to stop corruption.
Joko, a former furniture exporter, is known as a politician with a simple lifestyle and common touch, and as a successful governor in the capital Jakarta. Opponents have branded him inexperienced, and accused him of being a Christian Chinese and a communist in an attempt to alienate him from the Muslim majority.
