Prabowo Subianto cancels China visit after public servants killed in blaze
The Indonesian president cancelled a planned visit amid rising violence as three civil servants die in a fire set by protesters.
Indonesian President Prabowo Subianto has cancelled a planned trip to China next week amid escalating unrest after three civil servants were killed and the country erupted in angry demonstrations over the death of a man run over and killed by a police armoured vehicle a day earlier.
Mr Prabowo had been due to travel to Beijing for two of Xi Jinping’s biggest diplomatic set-pieces of the year – the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation and a military parade
marking the 80th anniversary of the end of World War II.
But the president had decided to stay in Indonesia to oversee efforts to restore order, local media reports.
Late on Friday, three civil servants were killed in a fire set by protesters in South Sulawesi on government buildings. What started as protests over MPs’ extravagant salaries and new housing allowances amid a soaring cost of living crisis escalated to massive, sometimes violent protests over the shocking fatal hit and run by a police mobile brigade (Brimob) of a 21-year-old online driver Affan Kurniawan on Thursday night.
Thousands of protesters took to the streets of the capital Jakarta and in other cities across Indonesia, including Bandung, Solo and Semarang in Java, Medan, in Sumatra and Makassar in Sulawesi where protesters set fire to government buildings.
The three casualties in Makassar were civil servants who worked at the regional legislative council and were believed to have been trapped when the building was set on fire on Friday night, state media agency Antara reported.
The charred remains of one 26 year-old female employee was found by the evacuation team, while another male victim also died at the scene.
The third victim, a 43 year old male staffer, was rushed to hospital but died later from extensive burns. Five people were also injured in the incident.
Across Jakarta, protesters also set fire to public facilities including bus stops and police offices.
President Prabowo Subianto visited Mr Affan’s home in Menteng, Jakarta, on Friday evening after earlier urging for calm in a livestreamed national address in which he assured the nation their concerns would be addressed and the police involved brought to justice.
“My fellow countrymen, I am shocked and disappointed by the excessive actions of the officers. I have ordered that last night’s incident be thoroughly and transparently investigated, and that the officers involved be held accountable,” Mr Prabowo said in his address.
“In such a situation I urge all citizens to remain calm and to place their trust in the government I lead. All the grievances of society will be noted and followed up.”
Police announced on Friday that seven Brimob officers inside the armoured vehicle that struck Mr Affan had been detained for 20 days and would face criminal charges.
Shocking footage of the incident taken near the nation’s parliament complex shows a Brimob armoured vehcile speeding along a public road where protesters were gathered before running over motorcycle delivery driver Affan Kurniawan, who can be seen in a green uniform scrambling on all fours to get out of the way before being struck.
The vehicle initially slows down after hitting Mr Affan — who colleagues insisted was in the middle of trying to deliver a food order and not involved in the process — but then speeds away after furious protesters mob the vehicle and try to extricate the victim, who later died from his injuries.
The fatality, which occurred as Indonesia’s foreign and defence ministers were in Canberra meeting with their Australian counterparts for the annual two-plus-two dialogue, provoked further violent clashes with police throughout the night with footage later in the evening showing crowds of protesters retreating over a railway track as security forces lob canisters of tear gas in their wake, and some demonstrators respond with molotov cocktails.
Police also lobbed teargas into a busy Jakarta metro station filled with commuters.
Authorities have confirmed several dozen people were injured in the violence, including ten police officers.
Indonesia’s National and Jakarta police chiefs both issued public apologies over Mr Affan’s death on Friday as more than 1000 Jakarta motorbike delivery drivers formed a convoy for his funeral.
“On behalf of the Jakarta police leadership and the institution, I extend my deepest apologies,” the city’s police chief General Asep Edi Suheri said, adding he had met with the family and local community leaders to express their condolences.
“I want to stress that we will take firm action against the members who committed violations. The family of the deceased has also asked for justice.”
General Asep also attended Mr Affan’s funeral where fellow motorbike couriers heckled him with shouts of “murderer” as he left the cemetery.
Footage of the hit and run by police, which has since gone viral on Indonesian social media along with the hashtags #f**kthepolice and #RIPIndonesianDemocracy, has sparked red hot fury online and plans for fresh protests outside police headquarters in Jakarta later on Friday that are feared will trigger more violence.
Rights groups across Indonesia have strongly condemned the police brutality against Indonesians exercising their democratic right to peacefully protest, urging the president and parliament to take action to avoid further escalation and more deaths.
Indonesia’s Legal Aid Foundation said police had used excessive force against protesters not only in Jakarta, but also in Pontianak, West Kalimantan, and Medan, Sumatra, where school-aged demonstrators were “beaten, stomped on the face and forced to remove their clothing”.
“In Jakarta most of those arrested were minors. They were hunted down, abducted, beaten, taken to police stations and denied legal assistance,” it said in a statement.
Students involved in protests earlier this week were also intimidated in their high schools by police, threatened with suspension or even prison if they joined further demonstrations, it added, warning such “thuggish actions under the guise of law enforcement” would become standard if nothing was done to curb such excesses.
A coalition of civil society groups also warned such excessive police violence set a “dangerous precedent that undermines democracy and the rule of law, and departs from human rights standards”.
Thursday’s protest was the latest in a string of anti-government demonstrations across the country amid mass lay-offs and deep cuts to the civil service and local government budgets from Jakarta as it seeks to claw back funds for the President’s multi-billion dollar priority projects, including a $45 billion free school meals scheme.
While ordinary Indonesians struggle with steeply rising living costs, a recent parliamentary regulation granting MPs a $A5000 a month housing allowance — almost ten times the average monthly wage in the country — sparked further anger.
Earlier this month close to 100,000 protesters gathered outside local mayor’s office in the central Java town of Pati to demand his resignation after he announced a 250 per cent rise in property and land taxes.
Tax hikes of up to 1000 per cent have been announced by local governments in dozens of regencies to try and make up shortfalls in budgets slashed by Jakarta’s austerity measures.
Workers began gathering peacefully outside Indonesia’s parliament in Jakarta late on Thursday morning to call for an increase in the minimum wage of up to 10.5 per cent and for the president to make good on a campaign promise to outlaw labour contracting by employers — a common tactic to avoid paying worker entitlements particularly in the banking, telecommunications and healthcare sectors.
Indonesia saw a massive jump in lay-offs in the first half of the year, with the Manpower Ministry recording 42,385 workers were made redundant in the six months to June, up from 32,064 during the same period last year.
While the ministry’s figures do not present a complete picture of hiring and firing in the country, where the informal sector contributes a large part of national economic activity, they are watched as an indicator of employment trends in various industries.
The manufacturing sector recorded the most job losses in the first six months of the year, with 22,671 workers laid off, followed by the wholesale and retail trade sector, and then the mining and quarrying sector.
Confederation of Indonesian Trade Unions spokesman Kahar Cahyono said the lay-offs were the result of a combination of a poorly implemented import policy and the Job Creation Law, which made it easier and cheaper for companies to sack workers.
“Both of these are government policies. The third blow was related to Trump tariffs. Our goods entering the US were taxed heavily, while at the same time their goods entering here had almost zero tariffs. That’s another blow,” he said.
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