Footsteps (6 page)

“Very impressive, sir,” cried van Zeggelen, “but could I also ask what it is about this woman that interests you?”

“She has done more than just write and more than just tell stories. She has dedicated her life to an ideal. She writes not to seek fame for herself. As a spiritual child of Multatuli, she has, in her own way, struggled in the name of humanity to lessen the suffering of humankind.”

General van Heutsz cleared his throat.

“Ignorance is always a barrier to prosperity. This is true in Europe, America, the Indies, or wherever,” van Kollewijn went on. “Mankind needs prosperity that he may live in conditions worthy of his humanity.” He glanced across at van Heutsz. “That is the importance of the educated Native.”

“Your Excellency, Honorable Member of Parliament, you have praised the idea of free labor. Are you therefore also in favor of the abolition of forced labor, of
rodi
?”

“Rodi is a traditional form of collective labor which has been used by the Indies for the benefit of the state and of society as an alternative form of state tax. It will be some time before rodi can be abolished because the circulation of money in the villages and hamlets is very limited. It is only in the cities that a cash economy prevails. The important thing today is to ensure that the system is not abused. We do not want to see the abuses of power that happened in Multatuli’s day.”

“If we view rodi as a form of tax, Your Excellency,” asked Ter Haar, “doesn’t that mean that the revenue received by the Netherlands Indies is much, much greater than that which is set down in the official budget? Doesn’t it mean that the official statement of annual income of the Indies is much smaller than it should be?”

Engineer van Kollewijn was silenced. There was sweat on his forehead. Hurriedly, he took out a handkerchief and wiped his brow. General van Heutsz’s fingers tapped upon the table. Marie van Zeggelen bit her lip. Everyone there, except the military man, waited expectantly for his answer. And van Kollewijn still didn’t answer.

“Just think, Your Excellency, ten million Natives each working twenty days’ rodi per year. At seven and a half cents per person per day of work, that’s ten million times twenty times seven and a half. That’s equal to fifteen million guilders a year. Fifteen million guilders that has never been accounted for or documented. Where did it all go?”

Silence.

Ter Haar went on. “And that’s not all, Your Excellency. I hear that the villagers themselves have to organize village security, something that the police should look after. And there’s the emergency services too—the fifteen million should probably be doubled. See, the villages have had thirty million guilders a year sucked out of them. Once, when the government was pressed for money, it thought of selling one of the Sunda Kelapa islands to an Arab. He was said to have offered one hundred and eighty thousand guilders. The equivalent of just a year of our debt to the villages would be enough for an Arab to buy the whole of Sunda Kelapa islands ten times over! Has Your Excellency given this matter any thought, either as an individual, a member of parliament, or a member of the Free Democratic party?”

“As free labor becomes more and more widespread, taxes in the form of rodi will gradually die out.”

“Yes, Your Excellency, if we calculate that rodi has been going ever since the Indies became the property of the Empire, at least from 1870, since the Forced Cultivation period, then the government of the Netherlands Indies and the Netherlands itself owes the Natives thirty times thirty million guilders or nine hundred million guilders. And if we count too all those hidden services provided by the people to the state free of charge, the figure will
probably go up to one billion guilders. The Netherlands is unable to fully repay the debt we owe the Natives as a result of the Forced Cultivation system, Your Excellency, let alone if we add all this unaccounted-for money.”

Even though I only half understood, I could still see that it was not van Kollewijn who was the god, but Ter Haar. This athletic-bodied Dutchman was tough-thinking and didn’t hesitate for a moment to expose the giant fraud that had been carried out upon my people. I trembled. I am unable to explain how I felt at that moment. I was not a god. I was not yet anything.

“Yes, it’s a pity that’s not on my agenda during this trip. Even so, I will take note of what you’ve said.” His corpulent body seemed even fatter now, and white, like a big fat white ghost.

“Yes, a pity,” repeated Ter Haar. “Does Your Excellency agree with my opinion that corruption during the East Indies Company period was just as great as that which exists today?”

“Corruption is not foreign to the Indies, especially to the Native ruling class,” van Kollewijn was forced to answer. “Isn’t that so, General?”

“It is not my responsibility to answer that question, unfortunately,” replied van Heutsz.

“A billion guilders corrupted over thirty years has nothing to do with the Natives. Don’t Christians always pay back their debts? When will the Netherlands pay back its thirty-year-old debt, and the interest that’s owing as well?”

General van Heutsz, head bowed, was concentrating on all that was being said, although his boredom was also obvious. I took another look around the table.

Ter Haar’s question remained unanswered. Van Kollewijn tried to laugh the question off. His friend the general seemed to understand his predicament. The general interrupted the silence to ask Marie van Zeggelen: “I think Marie van Zeggelen might be interested in other matters.”

She smiled and nodded, then: “If the chair does not object?”

The old man looked at van Kollewijn, who nodded in agreement.

“Yes, the opportunity is now open to Miss van Zeggelen and the gentlemen to ask questions of the general, even though it is outside the agenda.”

“On the condition, gentlemen, that nothing discussed here today is to go beyond this room,” said van Kollewijn.

“With the Aceh War drawing to an end, General…” she began to ask.

“It has been announced that the war, as a military exercise, is over,” the general butted in.

“Excuse me. Now that the war, as a military exercise, is over, can you say whether there is some light at the end of the tunnel? Can the Natives look forward to peace? Or the reverse?”

“That’s a matter for the Netherlands Indies government. It’s not for me to answer.”

“Thank you. But I am asking what the general’s own views are?”

“An honor.” Van Heutsz nodded quickly and happily. “However, as a soldier, it is not my job to talk about policies, let alone actually govern.”

“Exactly,” van Kollewijn backed him up.

“I mean your personal opinion,” Marie van Zeggelen pressed him.

“Personal opinion? Of course I have one, but it’s not for the public.”

“Of course. But don’t you think you should let your old friends, and your new ones here, know what your views are? Isn’t that fair enough, General, as long as there are no military secrets involved?”

“Very well, for my old and new friends who are here with us tonight. Everyone knows from the papers that the war in Aceh was very costly. Almost the total resources of the Indies, both manpower and money, were mobilized for that conquest. Now that the war is over, the government will, of course, be able to begin to strengthen the administration there, tighten security, and restore civil order. And to unify the Indies.”

“Of course, you mean
expand
, don’t you, not
unify
?”

“Unify.”

“I think the general has always preferred this new term, which in fact has the same meaning,” pressed Marie van Zeggelen.

“Nah, what did I say? A soldier shouldn’t get involved in talking.”

“Very true, General. This new term of yours explains everything very clearly.”

Van Heutsz laughed boisterously. His eyes pleaded for help from van Kollewijn, who was grinning, enjoying his friend’s discomfort.

“Once you’ve begun to speak,” the member of parliament said, “you must continue. What else can you do?”

All eyes were now focused on the general, famed for his conquest of Aceh. I had been observing him closely. I wanted to get a feel for how a killer talked and behaved.

“It’s not difficult to understand what the implications are. The money saved by ending the war in Aceh can now be put to other uses….”

His movements and the way he spoke were enough to make one feel confident in predicting that more wars would be breaking out everywhere. More Natives, armed with bows and arrows and spears, in as yet unknown places, would die in their hundreds on the orders of this man. For the sake of the unity of the colony, in other words, for the security of big capital in the Indies. The spilling of more blood, the loss of life, slavery, oppression, exploitation, humiliation—all this would occur at the wave of his hand. All this man sitting near me need do was point with his baton at the map, and somewhere in the Indies hell would descend to tear apart the lives of the people. Those left alive would be burdened with rodi, which would produce more of that unaccounted, unreported wealth for the Indies.

“No one should misunderstand,” van Heutsz went on. “The unification of the Indies does not mean expansionism. There are pockets of power, different political enclaves, a score or so, still left in these Indies, which are destabilizing surrounding regions—regions that have acknowledged the sovereignty of Her Majesty.”

“They are independent states,” said Marie van Zeggelen, “just like Aceh before it was conquered.”

“They are not states, they are stateless regions. They have no economy or monetary system. They have no foreign relations.”

“They are independent states,” Ter Haar retorted, “no matter how small or weak.”

“They use old Chinese coins, not their own coinage. In the Batak area, for example, they use the Spanish dollar,” answered van Heutsz.

“That’s no criterion. Some of them do have foreign relations. They all have systems of government. They have their own defenses. Isn’t that so, Your Excellency?”

Engineer van Kollewijn just smiled silently.

“And they are a source of strife,” van Heutsz stated firmly.

“Perhaps they think we are the source of strife, General.”

Van Heutsz laughed and nodded vigorously. He seemed to be enjoying the debate. Then: “That’s why we make, buy, and use guns.”

And whoever does not make them, buy them, and use them—now I understood—they become targets and victims.

“And what about East Papua? And Southeast Papua? Are they on the list of regions to be ‘unified’?”

“Ha-ha-ha,” the general laughed again. “I haven’t got any list. There is no list. No one has ever made a list.”

“And anyway,” Ter Haar added, “East Papua has become Germany’s burden. The Southeast is Australia’s.”

The discussion turned more and more into a debate. Van Kollewijn cleverly avoided becoming involved. His obese body didn’t seem to move at all, except for his head. And that only with difficulty.

“And West Papua is a heavy burden for the Indies. But we all know that west, east, or southeast, it’s all a matter of the prestige of the Empire. It’s got nothing to do with strategy, or colonial welfare, or even geopolitics.” Ter Haar kept pressing van Heutsz. “Are these pockets of power you talk about important only because of the prestige that would flow from their conquest or do you say it’s a matter of territorial integrity, General?”

“Prestige, territorial integrity, and power.”

“The party of the Honorable Member of Parliament, His Excellency van Kollewijn, is campaigning to repay the debt of honor we owe to the Indies—I hope this will not turn out to be just a promise used for political purposes.”

Van Heutsz seemed offended. He stopped laughing. His cheerfulness disappeared. His mustache trembled. “If I were in power, the Free Democratic party would be allowed to implement its program, on the condition that there were no more colonial wars in progress, that is to say, the wars would have to be finished first.”

Obviously such wars were going to continue. These murderers were still thirsty for blood, the blood of Natives, of my fellow countrymen.

“Excuse me, gentlemen,” interrupted our elderly host, “I think we should return to our official program. It will not be so easy for General van Heutsz to leave the Indies. Even though it might be somewhat difficult, it is possible for us to meet him. On the other hand, this is a rare opportunity for us to speak with
His Excellency, the Honorable Member of Parliament Mr. van Kollewijn, who may get out here only a couple of times every ten years.”

The questioning turned again to van Kollewijn and proceeded rapidly. Everyone deliberately ignored van Heutsz, who was on the verge of losing his temper. Everyone had asked some kind of important question. I was the only one who had not said anything. No doubt everyone was assuming that I felt inferior among these high-level European Pures. Then, all of a sudden, van Heutsz turned to me and said: “Mr. Minke…you have a very easy name to remember. You too must have some important questions.” He smiled, perhaps to help subdue his anger.

I showed no nervousness. Thanks be to God! I was the only Native, and the only young person, present. Acknowledgment by the conquering general of Aceh, it would be said, was still a real acknowledgment. I felt Ter Haar nudge my leg with his feet.

“Thank you, Your Excellency. Concerning this question of free labor, Your Excellency, does it include the freedom to evict farmers who do not wish to rent their land to the sugar mills?”

“Your question’s not quite clear,” said van Kollewijn, while looking one by one at each of those present. He was obviously preparing an answer. Or he considered my question to be totally stupid.

I repeated my question. He still didn’t answer. My nerves were on edge. I was afraid that my question was about to be disregarded as ridiculous. Was my question wrong or stupid? Everything was quiet, and the quiet tortured me. It was just a few seconds, but it felt like eternity. I caught Marie Van Zeggelen rocking her bag. Ter Haar shuffled on his chair. Why wasn’t my question answered?

“Is that sort of thing still happening?” asked van Kollewijn. His eyes spoke to van Heutsz.