AYO BERHIMPUN!


                  
In the past, during The Graet  Depression, when Sukarno was put in jail for agitation agains the Dutch East Indies administration.   Hatta and  Sutan Syahrir continue [reorganize] National Party. They give a new formulation of the "Party" - namely "Education" - thus giving new dimensions and directions for politics. It's alter characteristics of the Party from mass mobilization into an institution of Education [prepare future leadership]. I find this is the correct attitude and perception for anyone NOW to  join a political party, defining current national issues [corruption, unemployment] and to search grounds for provide solution. For 2014, SRI will become the first party founded on that awareness. The presence in election is expected by new generation of voters, namely the present People of Indonesia. Hopefully! Thx.
Sukarno argued that all of the principles of the nation could be summarized in the phrase gotong royong  [solidarity]


In early 1929, during the Indonesian National Revival, Sukarno and fellow Indonesian nationalist leader Mohammad Hatta (later Vice President), first foresaw a Pacific War and the opportunity that a Japanese advance on Indonesia might present for the Indonesian independence cause.In February 1942 Imperial Japan invaded the Dutch East Indies quickly defeating Dutch forces who marched, bussed and trucked Sukarno and his entourage three hundred kilometres from Bengkulu to Padang, Sumatra. They intended keeping him prisoner and shipping him to Australia, but abruptly abandoned him to save themselves upon the impending approach of Japanese forces on Padang.

The Japanese had their own files on Sukarno and the Japanese commander in SumateraJakarta, where he re-united with other nationalist leaders recently released by the Japanese, including Mohammad Hatta. There, he met the Japanese commander General Hitoshi Imamura, who asked Sukarno and other nationalists to galvanise support from Indonesian populace to aid Japanese war effort.

Sukarno was willing to support the Japanese, in exchange for a platform for himself to spread nationalist ideas to the mass population. The Japanese, on the other hand, needed Indonesia's manpower and natural resources to help its war effort. The Japanese recruited millions of people, particularly from Java, to be forced labor called "romusha" in Japanese. They were forced to build railways, airfields, and other facilities for the Japanese within Indonesia and as far away as Burma. Additionally, the Japanese requestioned rice and other food produced by Indonesian peasants to supply their own troops, while forcing the peasantry to cultivate castor oil plants to be used as aviation fuel and lubricants.

To gain cooperation from Indonesian population and to prevent resistance to these draconian measures, the Japanese put Sukarno as head of Tiga-A mass organisation movement. On March 1943, the Japanese formed a new organisation called Poesat Tenaga Rakjat (POETERA/ Concentration of People's Power) under Sukarno, Hatta, Ki Hadjar Dewantara, and KH Mas Mansjoer. The aim of these organisations were to galvanise popular support for recruitment of romusha forced labor, requisitioning of food products, and to promote pro-Japanese and anti-Western sentiments amongst Indonesians. Sukarno coined the term, Amerika kita setrika, Inggris kita linggis ("Let's iron America, and bludgeon the British") to promote anti-Allied sentiments. In later years, Sukarno was lastingly ashamed of his role with the romusha. Additionally, food requisitioning by the Japanese caused widespread famine in Java which killed more than one million people in 1944-1945. In his view, these were necessary sacrifices to be made to allow for future independence of Indonesia. He also was involved with the formation of Pembela Tanah Air (PETA) and Heiho (Indonesian volunteer army troops) via speeches broadcast on the Japanese radio and loud speaker networks across Java and Sumatera. By mid-1945 these units numbered around two million, and were preparing to defeat any Allied forces sent to re-take Java.

In the meantime, Sukarno eventually divorced Inggit, who refused to accept her husband's wish for polygamy. She was provided with a house in Bandung and a pension for the rest of her life. In 1943, he married Fatmawati. They lived in a house in Jl. Pegangsaan Timur No. 56, confiscated from its previous Dutch owners and presented to Sukarno by the Japanese. This house would later be the venue of the Proclamation of Indonesian Independence in 1945.

On 10 November 1943 Sukarno and Hatta was sent for seventeen-day tour of Japan, where they were decorated by the Emperor Hirohito and was wined and dined in the house of Prime Minister Hideki Tojo in Tokyo. On 7 September 1944, with the war going badly for the Japanese, Prime Minister Kuniaki Koiso promised independence for Indonesia, although no date was set.This announcement was seen, according to the U.S. official history, as immense vindication for Sukarno's apparent collaboration with the Japanese.The U.S. at the time considered Sukarno one of the "foremost collaborationist leaders."

On 29 April 1945, with the fall of Philippines to American hands, the Japanese allowed for the establishment of Badan Penjelidik Oesaha-oesaha Persiapan Kemerdekaan Indonesia (BPUPKI), a quasi-legislature consisting of 67 representatives from most ethnic-groups in Indonesia. Sukarno was appointed as head of BPUPKI and was tasked to lead discussion to prepare the basis of a future Indonesian state. To provide a common and acceptable platform to unite the various squabbling factions in BPUPKI, Sukarno formulated his ideological thinking developed for the past twenty years into five principles. On 1 June 1945, he introduced these five principles, known as pancasila, during the joint session of BPUPKI held in the former Volksraad Building (now called Gedung Pancasila).

The Japanese approached him with respect, wanting to use him to organise and pacify the Indonesians. Sukarno on the other hand wanted to use the Japanese to free Indonesia: "The Lord be praised, God showed me the way; in that valley of the Ngarai I said: Yes, Independent Indonesia can only be achieved with Dai Nippon...For the first time in all my life, I saw myself in the mirror of Asia." On July 1942, Sukarno was sent back to Pancasila as presented by Sukarno during the BPUPKI speech, consisted of five common principles which Sukarno saw as commonly shared by all Indonesians:

  1. Nationalism, whereby a united Indonesian state would stretch from Sabang to Merauke, encompassing all former Dutch East Indies
  2. Internationalism, meaning Indonesia is to appreciate human rights and contribute to world peace, and should not fall into chauvinistic fascism such as displayed by Nazis with their belief in the racial superiority of Aryans
  3. Democracy, which Sukarno believed has always been in the blood of Indonesians through the practice of consensus-seeking (musyawarah untuk mufakat), an Indonesian-style democracy different from Western-style liberalism
  4. Social justice, a form of populist socialism in economics with Marxist-style opposition to free capitalism. Social justice also intended to provide equal share of the economy to all Indonesians, as opposed to the complete economic domination by the Dutch and Chinese during the colonial period
  5. Belief in God, whereby all religions are treated equally and have religious freedom. Sukarno saw Indonesians as spiritual and religious people, but in essence tolerant towards differing religious beliefs
On 22 June, the Islamic and nationalist elements of BPUPKI created a small committee of nine, which formulated Sukarno's ideas into the five-point Pancasila, in a document known as the Jakarta Charter:

  1. Belief in one God, with obligation for Muslims to observe Islamic law
  2. Civilised and just humanity
  3. Unity of Indonesia
  4. Democracy through representative consensus-building
  5. Social justice for all Indonesians
Due to pressure from the Islamic element, the first principle mentioned the obligation for Muslims to practice Islamic law (sharia). However, the final Sila as contained in the 1945 Constitution which was put into effect on 18 August 1945, excluded the reference to Islamic law for sake of national unity. The elimination of sharia was done by Mohammad Hatta based upon request by Christian representative Alexander Andries Maramis, and after consultation with moderate Islamic representatives Teuku Mohammad Hassan, Kasman Singodimedjo, and Ki Bagoes Hadikoesoemo.

On 7 August 1945, the Japanese allowed the formation a smaller Panitia Penjelidik Kemerdekaan Indonesia (PPKI), a 21-person committee tasked with creating specific governmental structure of future Indonesian state. On 9 August, the top leaders of PPKI (Sukarno, Hatta, and KRH Radjiman Wediodiningrat), were summoned by Commander-in-Chief of Japan's Southern Expeditionary Forces, Field Marshal Hisaichi Terauchi, to Da Lat, 100 km from Saigon. Field Marshal Terauchi gave Sukarno the freedom to proceed with preparation for Indonesian independence, free of Japanese interference. After much wining and dining, Sukarno's entourage was flown back to Jakarta on 14 August. Unbeknownst to the guests, atomic bombs had been dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and the Japanese were preparing for surrender.

The following day, on 15 August, the Japanese declared their acceptance of Potsdam Declaration terms, and unconditionally surrendered to the Allies. On the afternoon of that day, Sukarno received this information from leaders of youth groups and members of PETA Chairul Saleh, Soekarni, and Wikana, who had been listening to Western radio broadcasts. They urged Sukarno to declare Indonesian independence immediately, while the Japanese were in confusion and before the arrival of Allied forces. Faced with this quick turn of events, Sukarno procrastinated. He feared bloodbath due to hostile response from the Japanese to such a move, and was concerned with prospects of future Allied retribution.

At early morning on 16 August, the three youth leaders, impatient with Sukarno's indecision, kidnapped him from his house and brought him to a small house in Rengasdengklok, Karawang, owned by a Chinese family and occupied by PETA . There they gained Sukarno's commitment to declare independence within the next day. That night, the youths drove Sukarno back to the house of Admiral Tadashi Maeda, the Japanese naval liaison officer in Menteng area of Jakarta, who sympathised with Indonesian independence. There, he and his assistant Sajoeti Melik prepared text of Proclamation of Indonesian Independence.


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