Land rights and citizenship continu

Land rights and citizenship continue to shape the contemporary Indonesian political landscape. Decades after independence, Indonesia’s indigenous peoples have asserted that they remain de facto subjects because the state is yet to fulfil the promise which goes with their Indonesian citizenship — the promise to recognize and protect their rights to their ancestral lands. United under Aliansi Masyarakat Adat Nusantara (Indigenous Peoples Alliance of the Archipelago, AMAN), Indonesia’s indigenous peoples made explicit their sentiments toward the state in AMAN’s first congress in 1999: ‘If the state does not recognise us, we don’t recognise the state’. Their relentless struggle to gain much deserved ‘full citizenship’ forces one to reflect on Agus Salim’s wise counsel: only when humanity becomes the unifying base for citizenship would Indonesia emerge a prosperous nation.