Indonesian Riots of 1998
A tragic event reaching levels of atrocity not unlike that of the Holocaust or any of
the genocides ranging from the Armenian to Rwandan, the riots of Indonesia in 1998
are comparatively unknown. Despite the relatively short span and scale of the incident,
at less than 2 weeks time and across 3 provinces respectively, the 1,500 casualty toll
will forever remind the people of Indonesia of the heinous crime that had been
committed in Medan, Jakarta, and Surakarta. The 1998 riots were primarily caused by
the lack of faith in the running government at the time, during an economic downturn
that would plummet the country into an inflation and unemployment ridden dilemma.
While government lost its credibility and henceforth its restraint on the people, the latter
rebelled in a bloodied rage against the ethnically Chinese residents of the
aforementioned cities. Murder, rape, arson, looting, violence and so on; every criminal
act imaginable was exercised in the city of Medan, a city of just over a million in
population. A riot-torn Medan soon saw the spread of chaos reaching southern
provinces Jakarta and Surakarta just days after riots subsided in the city. In Jakarta,
more than 1,000 died in the burnings of department stores, markets, and even
campuses in just 3 days. The violence was exacerbated to the point where Chinese
residents of the Chinatown district had to hire local thugs for protection against
indonesian rioters and looters, the latter of which were also killed indiscriminately during
the burning of Chinese owned markets during acts of arson. Across a blood stained two
weeks in may, after numerous exchanges of stray bullets, homemade molotovs, tear
gas canisters and thrown rocks, and at the cost of thousands of lives and injuries, the
riots finally abated upon the eventual yet much overdue government intervention.
However, the government’s inaction during said two weeks of chaos was largely the
reason for the death and suffering in the first place, which to this day is the reason the
Indonesian government faces domestic and international scrutiny regarding the incident.
The background of the riots involve both the cultural aspect and the socio-
economic aspect of the country of Indonesia. First, Indonesia is a very heterogenous
country diverse in races, religions, cultures, and languages. The Sriwijaya Kingdom
united the people of archipelago in the 1100’s, then the Majapahit Kingdom took over in
the 1300’s, then eventually the Republic of Indonesia formed in the 1900’s. Among the
multitude of upheavals and uprisings between kingdoms and generations, Dutch
colonial rule further cemented the root of violence, hatred and racial oppression in the
history of this country. On the socio economic side, despite its renowned
macroeconomic management on the international platform and even its steady
economic growth over the years since the modern era, the Asian financial crisis starting
in 1997 marked the beginning of the crumbling social infrastructure. Monetary crisis saw
the value of the Indonesian currency drop to one sixth of its value within months, and by
the end of 1997 the entire country had seen an incredible scale of unemployment forced
by the economic downturn leaving a sizeable proportion of the population without a
source of income. With banks being liquidated, inflation on a grand scale, and jobs
being more and more scarce, living conditions took a turn for the worst. Having
understood the immediate background of the incident, one should then question the
correlation between the targeting of ethnically Chinese residents during the riots. The
Chinese have had major settlements along the north coast of Java by the time the
Dutch arrived in early 1600’s to colonize Indonesia. As trade flourished between China,
India, and South East Asia, a harbor in Java became the headquarters of the Dutch
East India Company. The coast of Java soon became a hot spot for trade across the
Eastern Asian region, while Chinese immigration bloomed under Dutch government
rule. However, the Dutch introduced a racial classification system that separated the
ethnically Chinese with the indigenous people, which rooted the seeds of separatism in
the country’s history. Ever since, the Chinese community has grown steadily to make up
around to 1 percent of the country’s population. The reason for the prejudice that
Chinese Indonesians undergo, however, starts with the classification policy. They were
considered “foreign orientals” and were ushered off the stage of the socio-political
scene on the national level. On the other hand, their economic success garnered more
and more
hatred from native merchants whose discrimination and animosity towards the former
steadily increased since the 1950s due to their belief that they could no longer compete.
With the ethnic implications of socio-economic tension within the country for decades
upon decades, the riot saw the release of the resentment and envy of natives upon
Chinese Indonesians. Connecting both the cultural and socioeconomic facets of the
prelude to the riot, however, is the country’s presidency. The ludicrous presidency was
not only plagued by widespread rumors of rigged voting, hated by the people for its
oppression of free speech, and a shaky presidency upon which little trust is built over
the other candidacies, but during the economic crisis the noncompetitive practices that
tended to the financial interests of President Suharto and his family and cronies
enraged the public fueling the resentment of government that would later plunge the
country into turbulence. When the economy finally hit rock bottom, it seemed that those
afflicted with poverty, rage, and anger had but one idea in common: to rebel against
those who are better off. And with the government so out of reach, their most immediate
target became the people whom they have classified as outcasts and targets of
economic envy for generations — the Chinese.
The first stage of riots started in Medan, but the prelude to the intensified
violence had begun since early May, 1998, Students demonstrated for two months in
protest of government inaction during the crisis, especially after the newly elected
president Suharto’s March reinstatement of the Seventh Development Cabinet which
included his friends and family members in such economic travesty. The protesters grew
in numbers and demanded publicly for reforms in the country to end the crisis. Soon,
security officials were caught in skirmishes with protesters, converting tear gas and
