An advocate for victims of sexual violence against ethnic Chinese women during the May 1998 tragedy, Ita Fatia Nadia, says she has suffered repeated incidents of intimidation after criticising a statement by the Minister of Culture, Fadli Zon, in which he said there was no evidence of mass rapes during the 1998 riots.
Nadia said that she received the first threatening phone call just a few hours after she spoke at an Indonesian Women's Coalition (KPI) press conference on Friday June 13. During the press conference, she rejected Zon's statement and called the minister's remarks a public lie.
"You're a Chinese lackey because you are talking about Chinese rapes. Who said [President] Prabowo [Subianto] was involved", said Nadia imitating the threat from the mysterious caller on Friday at 8 pm.
Nadia attended the press conference with a number of other figures, namely human rights activist Kamala Chandra Kirana, University of Indonesia (UI) faculty of law professor Sulistyowati Irianto and Amnesty International Indonesia Executive Director Usman Hamid.
On that occasion, Nadia also emphasised that the rape of Chinese women was a historical fact, not a rumour, as Zon stated. She also rejected Zon's claim that National Commission on Violence Against Women (Komnas Perempuan) was not formed through a presidential decree signed by then president BJ Habibie.
On Saturday morning the following day, Nadia received a similar threat from the same number. The caller's voice was softer but still threatening, "Your mouth is asking to be silenced forever", said the caller.
Because of the series of threatening phone calls, Nadia chose to temporarily withdraw from public interviews. "I'm taking a break, choosing to save my family", she told reporters.
Nadia has been known as a women's activist since the New Order regime of former president Suharto. She was also part of the Joint Fact-Finding Team (TGPF) and the Volunteer Team for Humanity for the May 1998 tragedy.
At that time, he received death threats against her children and in the end chose to move from Jakarta to Yogyakarta.
As a commissioner of Komnas Perempuan from 1998 to 2006, Nadia also experienced similar threats after protesting the recent ratification of revisions to the Indonesian Military (TNI) Law. She stated that she had reported all threats to Amnesty International Indonesia.
Notes
Fadli Zon is a close confidant of President Prabowo Subianto who has been accused of playing a central role in sparking the May 14, 1998 anti-Chinese riots in Jakarta that saw hundreds of ethnic Chinese women raped and murdered and more than a thousand people killed. At the time, Prabowo was head of the Army's Strategic Reserves (Kostrad) based in Jakarta. In 2003, the National Human Rights Commission (Komnas HAM) accused Prabowo of responsibility "for gross human rights violations that occurred during the extensive rioting in Jakarta in 1998". The Komnas HAM report said that "security authorities at that time failed to curb the widespread riots that took place simultaneously". The spread of the riots was a result of a specific policy based on the "similar pattern at almost all places where the riots took place, which began with provocation, followed by an attack on civilians".
[Translated by James Balowski. The original title of the article was "Protes Fadli Zon, Aktivis Ita Fatia Diteror Bertubi-tubi Lewat Telepon".]
