Ardito Ramadhan, Jakarta – Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P) politician Guntur Romli has expressed surprise over a report filed with the National Police Criminal Investigations Directorate (Bareskrim Polri) against party colleague, Ribka Tjiptaning, by the People's Anti-Hoax Alliance (ARAH).
Guntur stated that Tjiptaning's statement about victims of the 1965-66 massacre is a historical fact recorded in official reports and therefore should not have been reported to the police.
"It's a historical fact and the findings of the Komnas HAM [National Human Rights Commission] fact finding team, so why was it reported to the police?", Romli told Kompas.com on Wednesday November 12.
According to Romli, data on the number of victims of the 1965-66 tragedy was also previously disclosed by Sarwo Edhie Wibowo, commander of the Army Para-Troops Command Regiment (RPKAD) at the time, who was also recently awarded the title of national hero.
"The victims of the '65-'66 massacres, there were 3 million according to Sarwo Edhie Wibowo's version who at the time was the commander of the RPKAD Troops. This is in the book 'G30S: Facts or Fabrications' by Julius Pour", he said.
Romli said that the 2012 report by the Komnas HAM fact finding team also estimated the number of victims of the 1965-66 massacre at between 500,000 and 3 million.
Based to the report, the party most responsible was the Operational Command for the Restoration of Security and Order (Kopkamtib), an institution directly under the command of President Suharto at the time.
"Kopkamtib was formed on October 10, 1965 to eradicate elements labelled as PKI [Indonesian Communist Party] or communist in society", said Romli.
He emphasised that the Komnas HAM investigation was a pro-judicial investigation based on Law Number 26/2000 on Human Rights Courts, which was then recommended to the Attorney General's Office for further investigation.
Therefore, Romli continued, the PDI-P views the awarding of the title of national hero to Suharto as a form of whitewashing past gross human rights violations.
He also noted that these violations have already been recognised as gross human rights violations by the government under former President Joko "Jokowi" Widodo in 2023.
"We consider the title of hero for Suharto a whitewashing of the massacre of Indonesians in '65-'66, which according to Komnas HAM was estimated to be 500,000 to 3 million people", Romli said.
"Not to mention other serious human rights violations, such as the Tanjung Priok tragedy, the Talangsari [massacre], Petrus [mysterious shootings], the DOM [Military Operations Area] in Aceh, the kidnapping of activists [in 1998] and the May 1998 riots", he added.
Tjiptaning reported to police
As previously reported, Tjiptaning was reported to the Bareskrim Polri by a group calling themselves the People's Anti-Hoax Alliance
The report was related to a statement by Tjiptaning in which he calling Indonesia's second president, Suharto, a "murderer of millions of people" during the polemic surrounding the proposal to nominate Suharto as a national hero.
"We came here to file a police report regarding a statement by a PDI-P politician, Ribka Tjiptaning, who stated that Pak [Mr] Suharto was a murderer related to the controversy surrounding the appointment of the late Suharto as a national hero", said ARAH Coordinator Iqbal, when met at Polri Bareskrim Headquarters in Jakarta on Wednesday.
"Ribka Tjiptaning stated that Suharto was the murderer of millions of people", Iqbal said.
Iqbal said that the report was filed because they consider Tjiptaning's statement to be misleading and contain elements of hate speech and the spread of fake news.
According to Iqbal, the statement was baseless because there was no court ruling that found Suharto guilty of murdering millions of people. "Of course, if this kind of statement is allowed to continue, it will certainly mislead the public", he said.
Iqbal noted that the video of Tjiptaning's statement circulating on social media was the main evidence in their report. He said Ribka made the statement on October 28, 2025, but he did not elaborate in detail where Ribka made the statement.
ARAH reported this case to the Polri Bareskrim Cyber Crime Directorate for alleged violation of Article 28 in conjunction with Article 45 of Law Number 11/2008 on Electronic Information and Transactions (ITE).
Iqbal emphasised that the report was not made on behalf of the Cendana family (Suharto's extended family), but was purely an ARAH initiative to protect public space from the spread of information deemed misleading. "No, we are from the People's Anti-Hoax Alliance", he said.
Tjiptaning remarks on Suharto
As previously reported, PDI-P Central Executive Board Chairperson Ribka Tjiptaning strongly rejected the proposal to nominate Suharto as a national hero. Tjiptaning questioned what was so great about Suharto that he deserved to be nominated as a national hero.
"(The title of hero for Suharto) personally, I strongly reject it. Yeah right? What's so great about Suharto as a hero", he told reporters at the PDI-P Party School in Lenteng Agung, South Jakarta, on Tuesday October 28. "It was only able to kill millions of Indonesians", said Tjiptaning.
He then touched on the alleged human rights violations committed by Suharto. She believes that the alleged human rights violations must be resolved first until everything is clear.
"Enough already, he was a human rights violator. There's not yet been a straightening out of history, enough already, he doesn't deserve to be made a national hero", said Tjiptaning.
[Translated by James Balowski. The original title of the article was "Ribka Tjiptaning Dilaporkan akibat Pernyataan soal Soeharto, Politikus PDI-P Membela".]
