Chinese-Indonesians and Discrimination: Indonesia

By Wombat | May 31st, 2006 | 1 Comment »

Chinese-Indonesians have been discriminated for decades in Indonesia. Being a prominently Islamic nation, some experts say this is the cause, but, there are other underlying factors.

A Chinese-Indonesian history of discrimination

For more than 40 years, Hariyanto has been judged by his ethnicity.

During the anti-communist pogrom in the mid-1960s, the native of Tanah Abang was accused of being a communist simply because he was a Chinese Indonesian.

Even today, his religion, Taoism, is constantly confused with Confucianism and his ID card says he is a Buddhist.

Years of official discrimination against Chinese-Indonesian citizens prompted Hariyanto and thousands of others to put Buddhism, one of the five religions then recognized by the government, on their ID cards.

While it may just be an imprint on a piece of paper, its consequences are serious.

“We all have to disguise what faiths we practice because we fear that government officials will meddle in our religious affairs,” Hariyanto said.

When he went to worship — the sign on the Taoist temple’s main gate also stated it was a Buddhist institution.
Despite this insult, ethnic Chinese like Hariyanto are so used to discrimination that they accept it as the norm.

“I personally don’t care anymore whether or not the government recognizes Taoism or Confucianism as religions. These are our beliefs, not theirs,” Hariyanto said.

“I don’t want to talk too much about the discrimination or else I will be accused of being a communist once again,” he said.

A member of the Army-sponsored Student Action Front during the 1960s, Hariyanto was labeled a communist because he was reluctant to join a campaign to crush the Indonesian Communist Party. After the fall of the New Order regime, the government officially recognized Confucianism as an established religions in the country, aside from Islam, Catholicism, Protestantism, Hinduism and Buddhism. However, this acceptance has not filtered down to the lower levels of bureaucracy.

Unfortunately for Hariyanto, Taoism, an offshoot of Confucianism, was not recognized. Most people here confuse Confucianism and Taoism because both are beliefs originally from mainland China.

However, Taoist texts reject many of the basic assumptions of Confucianism.

During his presidency, Abdurrahman “Gus Dur” Wahid tried to end discrimination against ethnic Chinese by officially recognizing their beliefs and culture.

However, despite the policy change, most ethnic Chinese say little has changed.

Daniel Lesmana, who lives in Palmerah in West Jakarta, says that being a Chinese Confucian means he is often extorted by government officials. The 45-year-old said that even if he wanted to state his real religion on his ID card, the process would be slow, costly and uncertain.

“Issuing ID cards and other documents to Chinese people has become a way for government officials to make money. That is why it is difficult to change their attitudes to us,” he said.

Daniel feels Chinese Indonesians here are being unfairly singled out by officials in the country, unlike Indonesian Arabs or Muslims from other ethnic groups.

Communities here are often targeted by officialdom in random ID card sweeps, especially when alleged wrongdoing by Chinese Indonesians is exposed in the media.

This happened earlier this month in Makassar, South Sulawesi, where tensions in the area were high following the death of a housemaid who worked for a Chinese family.

M. Taufiqurrahman