Part and parcel of the position is “instant” updates on general security issues which are provided by an independent security firm who monitor all aspects of daily “happenings” throughout the country.
While having a quiet beer with him in De Hooi last night his phone started beeping away with SMS received tones. This flurry of activity was a result of demonstrations in Jakarta which apparently were peaceful to start of with and were subsequently fueled by student unrest which led to the police (rather gleefully one assumes) despatching their long unused water cannons and tear gas canisters to the fray.
The peaceful protest was about the fuel price hikes, an everyday occurrence here, more of a token display off “we are not happy” than anything else. The proceedings became more sinister as about 1,000 Indonesian protesters angered by a student demonstrator's death after his arrest burned cars and hurled stones at police guarding the Parliament.
Their fallen comrade, Maftuh Fauzi, had been among approximately 100 students who were arrested at similar protests exactly one month ago at the National University. Maftuh, aged 27 years old died in the Pertamina Hospital last Friday (another twist on the tale later), and thus, the militants had three days to plan what their next move was.
(Editors Note: 27 years old and still at University, wonder what the fuck he was studying)
Yesterdays fun and games started at Parliament, then fucked off to Sudirman where they displayed the old “lets disrupt the traffic” tactic which escalated into “let’s burn a police car” and “fuckit, let’s kick the shit out off some buildings” (These descriptions of the evenings activities are paraphrased from a police spokesman).
Initially, the official excuse for breaking out the water cannon was to douse the flames on the police car which had been ignited, but, realizing more fun was to be had with these weapons they were turned on the crowd in an attempt to disperse protesters trying to break into the grounds of Parliament.
A short time later, some poor bastards car was set alight outside the Catholic Atmajaya University on Sudirman, effectively doing what rioters do best, stopping all homeward bound traffic on the city's busiest commuter route, snarling vehicles for miles.
The fuckwits who planned this carried a fake coffin and pictures of Maftuh Fauzi, demonstrating the fact that this had been a thought out and inflammatory deployment of “Student Wrath”.
Here’s the twist! (There is always one)
As Fauzi had died while in Police Custody, the fuckwits had planned to use this to up the ante on demonstrations regarding the issue off fuel price increase with his martyrdom. Meanwhile the authorities, eager to diffuse the situation decided to portray the luckless martyr as “one of loose morals and dubious sexual practices” claiming he had died of HIV / AIDS.
The AFP reports…..
The Indonesian Doctors' Association was seeking clarification from Pertamina Hospital, which said Fauzi died of HIV/AIDS. Students say he was beaten by police and died of his injuries.
A National Human Rights Commission investigation concluded that the police raid on Fauzi's university campus violated the students' rights and called for an independent autopsy for Fauzi, said commissioner Nur Kholis.
Watch this space, this looks like an issue which may raise the spark the Indonesian Tinder Box has been waiting for. As for that flurry off SMS messages my friend receives, I would prefer to do without them although, I did ask that he forward the “juicy ones”.
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