Indonesia's textbook rewrite can't erase a dark history

Moving forward requires grappling with difficult parts of the country's past.

- Arlina Arshad

JAKARTA - Since January, more than 100 Indonesian historians and archaeologists have been working on a new 10-volume national history series to be taught in schools. The project, which is backed by the Ministry of Culture, is scheduled for release before Indonesia marks its 80th Independence Day on Aug 17.

In theory, such an effort is overdue. Much of Indonesia's official historical narrative has not been updated in decades. A clear, honest and inclusive account of Indonesia's past is essential for educating the next generation.

But with the deadline fast approaching, unease is mounting. Critics fear the project may be less about historical accuracy and more about sanitising the past.

That discomfort has grown following troubling remarks from Culture Minister Fadli Zon, who leads the ministry steering the project. Mr Fadli, a close ally of President Prabowo Subianto and member of his Gerindra Party, has called for a more "positive tone" in the national history.

"If you want to dig for faults, that is easy. There are bound to be mistakes in every era, in every period," he was quoted as saying by Antara news agency on June 1.

On a podcast aired on June 11, he went further - casting doubt on the well-documented accounts of mass rape targeting Chinese Indonesians during the May 1998 riots. "There has never been any proof. That is just a story. If there is, show it," he said in a YouTube interview with local media IDN Times.

Following backlash, he insisted those were personal views, unrelated to the history project. He said he was not denying that sexual violence occurred, but questioned whether it happened on a "mass" scale. He added that the books will be prepared by professionals and subject to public consultation.