Indonesia – Malaysia Bilateral Ties

“The Impacts of the Past Unfinished Business”

1.The Unspoken Histories

The famously known “Ganyang Malaysia”3, a political phrase sounded firstly by Soekarno during the Indonesia-Malaysia conflict within 1961-1966 probably would have become one of the most provocative anthem about the two countries sentiment during these days. What makes this two “Negara Serumpun” became such a long time enemies that have never been found any slightest solutions?

The other well known political phrase from Soekarno was “JAS MERAH : Jangan Sekali-kali Melupakan Sejarah”4. Bearing in mind that Soekarno’s phrase, to analyze the basic problems between Indonesia and Malaysia, it is important to summarizing the historical moments between these two Southeast Asia’s members (which oftenly being ignored by some people).

The relations between Indonesia and Malaysia consists of various matters ranging from borderlines, migrant workers (especially women), cultural claims, and the latest one : Marine and Sovereignty.

2.Marine Issue : A Crucial Point for State’s Sovereignty

The conflict between Indonesia and Malaysia raised (again) on Friday, August 13th, when three officers of the Indonesia’s Fisheries Ministry were arrested by the Malaysian sea patrol as a response over Indonesia’s action in apprehending seven Malaysian fishermen who entered the Indonesian waters. This was happened at Tanjung Barikat waters, located in Bintan, Riau Island, Indonesia. The statement from Malaysia’s policemen were “It happened inside Malaysia’s water (means Malaysia’s territory).” Based on that argument, three Indonesia’s officers until now arrests by Polisi Diraja Malaysia (Malaysia’s Policemen Unit).

World don’t have to wait too long for the angers, protesters from mass organization named “Bendera (Benteng Demokrasi Rakyat)” threw some dirts to Malaysia Embassy in Jakarta soon after the arrests, and also burnt up the Malaysian flag (Jalur Gemilang Flag). And as a response, press in Malaysia took the issue as a headline.5 Foreign Minister of Malaysia, Anifah Aman, commented on the protest, said, “Bendera wants to have our citizens’ head cut bald and send them home. This is an insult not only for Malaysians, but those Indonesians who are against the violent measure.”

Why Indonesians were madly attacked the embassy and urge the government under Tun Abdul Razak to apologize? First, the incident was happened inside Indonesia’s water, not Malaysia’s territory, so the arrests of three Indonesia’s officials were hardly accepted. Second, the Malaysian sea patrol gave a warn shot before getting the Indonesia’s officers being handcuffed and arrested. It’s violating the Indonesia’s sovereignty!

Looking back at these two countries maritime conflicts, these are some points where the disputes arised:

a)Malacca Strait
b)The South China Sea
c)The Sulawesi Sea
d)Bintan, Riau Island

Marty Natalegawa, Indonesia’s Foreign Minister said in Jakarta, “Malaysia is considered too often violate the sovereignty of Indonesia.” This statement based on official report which shows that in 2010, there were about 14 times offences commited by Malaysia, where 10 times violation by entering Indonesia’s territory, occurred in three different locations : Natuna Island, The Strait of Malacca, and the latest one, Bintan.

Speaking about ‘sovereignty’, in United Nations Charter, article 2 (4), stated:
“All Members shall refrain in their international relations from the threat or use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of any State, or in any other manner inconsistent with the Purposes of the United Nations.”

Declaration on Principles of International Law concerning Friendly Relations and Cooperation among States in accordance with the Charter of the United Nations:6
“Every State has the duty to refrain in its international relations from the threat or use of force against the territorial integrity……”
“No territorial acquisition resulting from the threat or use of force shall be recognized as legal…”

(?) How much the marine conflict between Indonesia and Malaysia affects the bilateral relationship among them?
When Malaysian sea patrol arrests three Indonesia officers within Indonesia jurisdiction (territory), three things occurred:

1)Malaysia claimed the territory of Indonesia as their territory (The acquisition). In International Law context, there are special rule governing this issue:
“Every State has the right to establish the breadth of its territorial sea up to a limit not exceeding 12 nautical miles, measured from baselines determined in accordance with this Convention.”7
Every State has a FULL SOVEREIGNTY within their territorial sea, including Indonesia and the Tanjung Barikat in Bintan, Riau Island.

2)Malaysia sea patrol arrests three Indonesian officers within Indonesia’s sea territory while the officers were working at their regular basis.
Article 2 (3) of ICCPR (International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights) stated :
“Each State Party to the present Covenant undertakes: (1) To ensure that any person whose rights or freedoms as herein recognized are violated shall have an effective remedy, notwithstanding that the violation has been committed by persons acting in an official capacity; (2) To ensure that any person claiming such a remedy shall have his right thereto determined by competent judicial, administrative or legislative authorities, or by any other competent authorities provided for by the legal systems of the State, and to develop the possibilities of judicial remedy; (3) To ensure that the competent authorities shall enforce such remedies when granted.”

3)Malaysia are not welcoming the idea of apologizing to Indonesia government, they rejected any idea of wrongdoing by Malaysia sea patrol, even after Marty Natalegawa claimed Tanjung Barikat as Indonesia territory
Even if Malaysian government claiming in a future about the usage of ‘Right of innocent passage’8, Indonesia government should reject the arguments regarding the points stated in Article 19 (2) of UNCLOS 1982:
“Passage of a foreign ship shall be considered to be prejudicial to the peace, good order or security of the coastal State if in the territorial sea it engages in any of the following activities:

(a)Any threat or use of force against the sovereignty, territorial integrity or political independence of the coastal State, or in any other manner in violation of the principles of international law embodied in the Charter of the United Nations;
(b)Any exercise or practice with weapons of any kind;
(c)Any act aimed at collecting information to the prejudice of the defence or security of the coastal State;
(d)Any act of propaganda aimed at affecting the defence or security of the coastal State;
(e)The launching, landing or taking on board of any aircraft;
(f)The launching, landing or taking on board of any military devices;
(g)…………”

3.Dispute Resolution (is it Already Defined as a Dispute?)

The dispute settlement provisions in the 1982 United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea are remarkable for their detail and variety. When a dispute arises, the parties must ‘proceed to an exchange of views regarding its settlement by negotiation or other peaceful means’, those peaceful means might be established in advance by agreement between them. Only where settlement is not possible by means chosen by the parties to the dispute would the elaborate dispute settlement provisions of the 1982 Convention come into play.

(1)Negotiation
(2)The International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea9
(3)The International Court of Justice
(4)Arbitral Tribunals

“But don’t misunderstand. Once again, if it pertains to our fundamental interests, our sovereignty and our territory, we should of course do what we have to do. There is no compromise.”11 Yudhoyono on Cabinet Meeting, August 30th.

DO WHAT, MR. PRESIDENT?

WHAT SHOULD WE LEARN FROM EURO TRAGEDY?

If you (we) want to blame all this catastrophes that been formed after the Euro crisis around Europe zone lately, I personally believe that we should look up at Maastricht Treaty or what famously called as ‘The treaty on European Union’. Signed on February 7, 1992 and entered into force on November 1, 1993, this treaty was created by Belgium, Denmark, Germany, Greece, Spain, France, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, The Netherlands, Portugal, and United Kingdom.

As the main gate for entering European Union itself (the treaty) and as the necessity to use Euro as their country’s currency, these countries must comply with some criterias (requirements) which known as ‘Maastricht Criteria’.

MAASTRICHT CRITERIA

-The inflation rate should be no more than 1,5% above the rate for the three EU member states with the lowest inflation over the previous year;

-Budget deficit must generally be below 3% of Gross Domestic Product (GDP);

-The national debt should not exceed 60% of GDP (exception: A country with a higher level of debt can still adopt the Euro provided it’s debt level is steadily decreasing);

-The long term rate should be no more than 2% of the rate in the three EU countries with the lowest inflation over the previous year;

-The applicant country must be a member of The Exchange-Rate Mechanism (ERM II) under The European Monetary System (EMS) for 2 consecutive years (The national’s currency exchange rate should not have devaluated it’s currency during the period).

As the time flew, Britain and Denmark opted out of these Maastricht treaty plans, and Euro finally replaces the old national currency of EU’s countries on January 1st, 2002. After 18 years, how all of these ‘perfect’ criterias mentioned at Maastricht Criteria could not produced strong, constant, and unwavering currency named Euro, like we’ve seen these last months over the region and to be compared with other currencies? How could Euro eventually punched by Dollar or even the stability of China’s Yuan at the stock market?

For information, the print edition of The Economist present the article titled “Chips off the block; Currencies around Asia are more flexible than you think”, under their ‘Asian Currencies’ section’. In this article, said “AMID all the diplomatic ding-dong over China’s yuan, it is easy to lose sight of emerging Asia’s other currencies. There is not much din over the dong, for example. While China has kept the yuan pegged to the dollar since July 2008, ignoring complaints that it is artificially cheap, Vietnam’s currency, the dong, has depreciated by 13% against the greenback over the same period, unremarked and unprotested. South Korea and Taiwan, the only countries besides China ever to be labelled currency manipulators by America’s Treasury, have seen their currencies cheapen by 17% and 6% respectively.”

And the ‘trouble maker’ behind these Asia’s stability called ‘Yuan Block’ by some experts. It stated also inside the article: “China’s neighbours and rivals are reluctant to allow their currencies to rise too far against the yuan, for fear of losing China as a customer, or losing out to it as a competitor. Thus although China accounts for only 19% of America’s imports, its peg, it is argued, frustrates a broader realignment of currencies in the region.”

Leave the Yuan and other Asia’s currency on behold, Euro as the main (single) currency within European Union’s countries (UK Pounds as an exemption), in fact was terribly failed down under the shadows of debts and disintegration of the EU’s leaders itself, like we saw at the Greece bail out case where France, Italy, and Germany seems vague and uncertain whether the Papandreou’s country should get assistance of EU or straightly go to International Monetary Fund (IMF). At very last, France and Italy agree with the bail out proposal, while leaving German chancellor, Angela Merkel alone at this ambiguity. It shows to the world that European leaders seems divided at their economical policies making during this horrible crisis.

In other hand, European Central Bank which was built under Maastrich Treaty to be functioned to set the interest rates, was joined Merkel in opposition to straight-up Greek bail out.

“There shouldn’t be any subsidy element, no concessionary element”
European Central Banking chief Jean-Claude Trichet

Finally, Euro-region governments are betting 110 billion euros ($146 billion) in economic medicine for Greece will be enough to vaccinate the rest of their region from contagion. EU’s Finance ministers approved the unprecedented bailout for Greece after a week that saw the country’s fiscal crisis spread to Portugal and Spain.

The EU and the International Monetary Fund, which is (finally) co- financing the bailout, also agreed to set up a bank stabilization fund. And is that all? No more problems? NO. BIG NO-NO.

“The euro will remain weak and there’ll be more bailouts, for Greece, it means terrific austerity and terrific recession.” Marc Faber, publisher of the Gloom, Boom & Doom, said in a Bloomberg Television interview, in Hong Kong.

Seems that the Europe is on highly demand of another bail out, since another countries go through another high amount of debts. Spain’s budget deficit was the third-highest in the euro region last year, at 11.2 percent of GDP. Portugal’s budget deficit was the fourth-biggest at 9.4 percent of output. Ireland had the highest at 14.3 percent and Greece’s was 13.6 percent (Source : Business Week). The speculation among leaders and economist going strong lately.

“Unless Portugal and Spain proactively take additional measures to bolster their fiscal and growth outlook, markets will be tempted to test whether the EU has appetite for any further rescues after the breathtakingly large commitment made to Greece,” Marco Annunziata, chief economist at UniCredit Group in London.

These all madness creates different solutions from many experts. One of them is Barry Eichengreen, Professor of Economics at the University of California, Berkeley. He wrote his opinion on Project Syndicate’s website titled “Europe’s Historic Gamble”. He mentioned Greece bail out as “Europe’s fortnight mirabilis”. Furthermore, Eichengreen mentioned what he called “Other elements of a proper monetary union”, I will quoting his ideas here:

1.Europe needs a Stability Pact with teeth. This will now happen, because Germany will insist on it. As the European Commission has proposed, the strengthened pact will have tighter deficit limits for heavily indebted countries. Exceptions and exemptions will be removed. Governments will be required to let the Commission vet their budgetary plans in advance.

2.Europe needs more flexible labor markets. Adjustment in the United States’ monetary union occurs partly through labor mobility. This will never apply to Europe to a similar degree, given cultural and linguistic barriers.

3.The euro area needs fiscal co-insurance. It needs a mechanism for temporary transfers to countries that have put their public finances in order but are hit by adverse shocks.

4.The eurozone needs a proper emergency financing mechanism. Emergencies should not be dealt with on an ad hoc basis by 27 finance ministers frantic to reach a solution before the Asian markets open. And European leaders, in their desperation, should not coerce the European Central Bank into helping. There should be clear rules governing disbursement, who is in charge, and how much money is available. It should not be necessary to obtain the agreement of 27 national parliaments each time action is needed.

5.Europe needs coherent bank regulation. One reason the Greek crisis is so difficult is that European banks are undercapitalized, overleveraged, and stuffed full of Greek bonds, thereby ruling out the possibility of restructuring – and thus lightening – Greece’s debt load.

I’m not an economist (yet) and I think I’m not going to be, but what I’m doing here is sharing what I’ve observed lately from the Euro’s crisis. It shows to us all around the world, single currencies can bring you two things : First, it brings you to the equality, egalitarianism. But in other side, it can also brings you to the similarity, in Euro case it’s the resemblance of debts, debts, and debts.

Jakarta, June 8, 2010.

The Ban of Minarets in Switzerland

Apparently, I remember the influence of Christopher Hitchens’s controversial yet cynical book famously named “God is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything”, published at 2007.

Hitchens stating some disapproval quotes regarding to the choice of beliefs in general way and also questioning the power of God itself, like pictured in this statement: Why if God was the creator of all things, were we supposed to “praise” him for what came naturally? By delivering this book to the world, Hitchens tried to influence mass society and invite them all to criticize the compatibility of modern beliefs with scientific knowledges and technology’s improvement nowadays. Figuratively this author have been generally spread out a shambles of religion or in the other word what we also known as religion haters.

We can call Hitchens as a nuisance, but on the other hand I personally grant him an award for his effort to nudging the world’s debate on how the religions possibly containing people’s mind with fundamentalism and fanaticism, not to forget to mention the 9/11 tragedy which we all informed that it was Al Qaeda’s responsibility (Islamic Fundamentalist Organization based on Afghanistan). Now, the debate’s still going strong or even much stronger in Switzerland, but in other form.

This time, the subject is not the religion as a whole, but the construction of Minarets (generally tall spires with onion-shaped usually either free standing or taller than any associated support structure), which in this Schengen state got turbulenced by some political wings of the country. Seems like there will be only 4 minarets inside Switzerland’s territory (Geneva, Zurich, Winthertur, and Wangen bei Olten) until the end of the world, since the voting agreed to the ban of minarets controversial construction after this issue got raised by the right wings politicians mainly from the Swiss’s People’s Party and the Federal Democratic Union, the Egerkingen Committee (Egerkinger Kommittee). Officially, only 4 of 26 Swiss Cantoons (Swiss Cantons are the member states of the federal states of Switzerland) which mostly in the French-speaking part of the country disagree or opposed the initiatives.

It was all started at 1997, when Recep Tayyip Erdogan who later become Turkish Prime Minister, giving his speech by saying "Mosques are our barracks, domes our helmets, minarets our bayonets, believers our soldiers. This holy army guards my religion."

This statement gloriously debatable in many ways, including for the Egerkinger Commmittee’s exponent, Ulrich Schluer, who later defends on his own arguments that “A Minaret has nothing to do with religion, it just symbolises a place where Islamic law is established.” The Egerkingen Committee which also include Swiss People’s Party and Federal Democratic Union subsequently initiate the idea of banning the contruction of minarets in Switzerland, after there’s conflicts between local residents in Wangen bei Olten with Turkish Cultural Association regarding to the application for a construction permit to erect a 6-metre-high minaret on the roof of its Islamic Community Centre, in 2005.

The Committee strongly exude that the Minaret should not have nothing to do with disturbing local communities lives, so from 2006 until 2008, they launch several cantonal initiatives against the erection of minarets. In a referendum on 29 November 2009, the amendment was approved by 57.5% of participating voters.

In writer’s personal argumentation, the minaret has nothing to do with the prayer activity itself, because the function so far is only about to calling for prayer time (adhan), which in Islam it has 5 times a day (at sunrise, noon, sundown, and evening). Later on, Adhan is called not from the minaret but from Musallah (small size of mosque, oftenly built on small areas) or prayer hall by using microphone. But still, traditionally the minarets is a part of Islamic long-remarkable struggled-history for many times. It first establishment was 80 years after the death of Prophet Muhammad, and in Arabic language Minaret means “Gate from Heaven and Earth”, that’s why the ban of the construction of Minarets (which is constructedly built on the top of the mosque or independently on two sides of the mosque itself) felt extranous for many Moslems.

On their official website, The Swiss government represented by the Federal Council (The Ministry of Foreign Affairs) and a clear majority of Parliament came out against the initiative, like we can see from the statement of The Head of the Federal Department of Justice and Police (FDJP), Federal Councillor Eveline Widmer-Schlumpf, “"These concerns have to be taken seriously. The Federal Council has always done so and will continue to do so in future. However, the Federal Council takes the view that a ban on the construction of new minarets is not a feasible means of countering extremist tendencies."

At this time, I believe that what this country needs is the dialogue between religious and social groups and also the representatives of the ban initiator as a pre-emptive action that could be taken soon, since this religion issue is a very essential yet sensitive ones in every country, especially in Europe where many immigrants from Middle East and also other Moslems live. If it’s not seeking the possible solution, it’s not impposible there will be another kind of cold war, where this world divided into many groups basically formed by their beliefs, and aggresively discriminate other religion who lives in their territory.

Religion is not something that we can use to opposing the others in a terms of self security and also state security. The terrorist is the exclusion of the religion beliefs, because there’s no religion who teach their believer to attack among them.

So the discrimination to some religion is something that needs to be solved immediately, before it raise into what Hitchens said in his book reveal: Violent, irrational, intolerant, allied to racism and tribalism and bigotry, invested in ignorance and hostile to free inquiry, contemptuous of women and coercive toward children: organized religion ought to have a great deal on its conscience.

Smiling

Ada seorang perempuan bersuamikan lelaki lumpuh yang sudah 8 tahun tidak bekerja.

Anaknya berumur 4,5 tahun, tidak bisa sekolah, dan memiliki kekurangan pada pendengarannya.

Setiap hari ia menjual tusuk sate di kota Ungaran, Jawa Tengah.

Selain menjajakan tusuk satenya, ia juga memberikan senyuman kepada hampir setiap orang yang ia temui.

Senyum = ibadah, menurutnya.

Ada seorang wanita karir di salah satu perusahaan pengelola 20 bisnis waralaba terkemuka, di Jakarta.

Ia memilih untuk tidak menikah, menjalani kehidupan percintaan dari satu lelaki ke lelaki lain yang ia temui di klub, dan mempercayai bahwa cinta itu omong kosong.

Gajinya lebih dari cukup, pergaulan sosialitanya lebih dari sekedar pertemanan melainkan perkumpulan orang-orang haus akan potret diri yang selanjutnya akan dipajang di facebook *semua dunia harus tahu betapa keren dan kaya-nya kami*

Ada seorang mahasiswa Indonesia di kota Utrecht, Belanda, yang setiap hari selalu sibuk dengan kuliah dan kerja sambilannya di Albert Heijn.

Dengan beasiswa dari NeSo, ia bisa bertahan dengan studi S-2nya di Utrecht University. Ia membuktikan bahwa kerja keras bisa membuat sesuatu yang terkesan tidak mungkin, menjadi mungkin.

Siapa yang sangka kalau ayahnya hanya supir taksi di Semarang?

Ada seorang mantan atlet renang Indonesia, yang kini menjadi pengusaha roti di Depok, Jawa Barat.

Ia tidak ingin anak-anaknya menjadi atlet seperti dirinya, karena ia tidak mau kegemilangan hidup anaknya kelak hanya akan seumur jagung.

Ketika ia menjadi atlet, ia punya segalanya, harta- fame - teman,

tapi setelah ia berhenti menjadi atlet, susah payah ia melanjutkan kembali hidupnya.

Indonesia terlalu cepat melupakan, pikirnya.

Untuk mengomentari 4 cerita singkat tentang 4 manusia di atas, saya hanya ingin mengutip apa yang dikatakan Benjamin Franklin:

"All human situations have their inconviniences. We feel those of the present but neither see nor feel those of the future; and hence we often make some troublesome changes without amendment, and frequently for the worse."

Well, for me, energy and persistence conquer all things.

What do you think?

Yogyakarta, 15 April 2009.

THE ART OF POLITICS

Maybe it sounds funny and ridiculous for some of you guys, but since i was 10 or something, i've falled in love with politics. The only major that i've wanted the most (when the final high school test was over) in my life is "POLITICS" in University of Indonesia - Jakarta. But God decided NO for me at that place, so here i am now: LAW STUDENT.

The basic reason why i still keep on dreaming about becoming one of those politician, is because: They rule the government! It's not about ur major, and also not only about ur academic records, but in my perception it based on your capabilities in negotiating and spreading the influence to other people. It's so obvious, high quality politicians on earth now is a kind of human who succesfully mantain his/her own emotion, so then they can manage others.

It's not as easy as i thought before, in fact, when i was in Harvard World MUN 2009 a week ago, it was so hard to equalize all perspectives into one resolution. And it needs 5 days for that.

So once again, POLITICS is an art. It's a part of the intellectuality that not many people have, and that's why it's very special. I wish i could learn more about it.. I have to.