Indonesia - An Unfinished Revolution
As we go to press...
Jakarta is once more reeling from bloody clashes between demonstrators and troops using tanks and live ammunition. In a crack-down against tens of thousand of unarmed protesters trying to reach the building where a session of the Suharto-era 'parliament' was meeting, at least twelve people have been killed and hundreds are reported to be badly injured. Eleven opposition activists have been arrested.
In the capital of Indonesia and elsewhere, students have been joined by workers and poor people in far larger numbers than even at the height of the movement in May which ended three decades of dictatorship.
They have faced vigilantes paid and armed by the government as well as the crack troops of the state. Interviewed by TV reporters, they have made it clear they are prepared to fight to the death. Sections of the armed forces such as the marines have openly given their support, helping to clear a path through the army blockades in the centre of Jakarta.
A new phase of the Revolution has opened. The country's president of just six months' standing - BJ Habibie - is being told to go, along with his armed forces commander, General Wiranto. They have only aggravated the deep crisis that grips Indonesian society.
All the issues raised in this pamphlet come sharply into focus once again. They demand the urgent attention of activists and socialists around the world who are willing with all their hearts a victorious outcome to the unfinished revolution in Indonesia.
It is to the heroic workers and youth of that country that we dedicate this pamphlet.
London November 16th 1998
Introduction
The Committee for a Workers' International, with affiliated sections, groups or members in more than 40 countries, regards the still unfolding revolution in Indonesia as one of the key developments of the present period. The felling of a decades-long dictatorship by a mass movement in May of 1998 shook the international capitalist class to the core. As the notorious 'Asian Crisis' spreads to the rest of the world, the devastation it has brought to the fourth most populated country is a pointer to what is in store elsewhere. So too is the response of the masses, moving as they have to take things into their own hands.
The only hope for further development in Indonesia and a whole series of so-called emerging countries lies in re-constructing society along socialist lines. Capitalism has failed. All it offers is a descent into actual barbarism.