War, Nationalism and Peasants: Java Under the Japanese Occupation, 1942-45: Java Under the Japanese Occupation, 1942-45 by Shigeru Sato

Author:Shigeru Sato [Sato, Shigeru]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Ethnic Studies, Public Policy, Social Science, Political Science, Regional Studies, General
ISBN: 9781317452362
Google: Ta_ACQAAQBAJ
Goodreads: 55630074
Publisher: Routledge
Published: 1994-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

Widening Fissures within the Indonesian Elite

The peasant rebellions in Indramayu exacerbated the worsening relationship between peasants and the pangreh praja, and within the Indonesian elite groups, because of Japanese mobilisation of Indonesian nationalists and Islamic leaders to put down the rebellions. The conflicts between the pangreh praja and the nationalists, which had been constantly worsening through the Triple A Movement and Putera, further deteriorated due to the riots. The conflict found its sharpest expression in a report, or rather a set of reports, concerning the rebellions, sent to the Japanese authorities.120 These reports were ostensively written by Prawoto Sumodilogo, who inspected Indramayu after the rebellions. Internal evidence, however, strongly suggests that they were written by different writers, using different typeprints, different styles of writing, and more importantly, were written from sharply differentiated points of view.

The author of Part I of the report was specified as the Sanyo to the Department of Industry; this was Prawoto. In the prewar years Prawoto served as Vice-Regent (Patih) of Indramayu for one and half years and thus had first-hand knowledge of the region. This part of the report was based on personal observations; interviews by the Sanyo and his assistants, statistics, and the writer’s knowledge of the area. The writer analysed the causes of the rebellions and proposed a way to improve the rice delivery system. He argued that the cause of the rebellions was neither religion, enemy propaganda, nor the policies of the central government, but the unequal allocation of the rice delivery quotas. The people in Indramayu petitioned the pangreh praja to equalise the quotas, but the haughty and strict pangreh praja and particularly the Regent, refused to pay heed to the people’s voice. This inflexible, high-handed, and arbitrary administration by the pangreh praja and their general ignorance and lack of concern about the situation of the peasantry was, according to the author, the basic cause of the event. Although Prawoto came from an aristocratic background and had been a pangreh praja himself, he was keenly aware of, and critical about, the widespread corruption among the pangreh praja and their general lack of concern about the welfare of the people they ruled.121 He also argued that villagers’ anger against the pangreh praja was not a new phenomenon. It had been gathering strength through a long history of oppression in the Dutch colonial era, and the rice issue was a catalyst for the rebellions. Now that the highly problematic pangreh praja were replaced, the basic cause had been removed, but still various problems such as lootings and widespread corruption remained. Thus he suggested strengthening the special police, and strengthening supervision over the milling and distribution of rice through the setting up of cooperatives which would have Indonesian representatives. He also suggested that rationing of commodities to the villagers should be done through the People’s Bank rather than through the pangreh praja and Chinese traders: further, that the quota system should be changed to a payment of land rent in kind in order to alleviate the plight of poor farmers.

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