Indonesians in Focus: Herawati Diah

When senior journalist Siti Latifah Herawati Diah looked at the calendar last April 3, she was stirred. Time really flies, she said to herself, indeed. Because on that day, Ibu Hera, as she is known to friends, turned 90. But, was she really 90? The same question preoccupied relatives and friends who came to her house to celebrate her birthday last week. It is not at all surprising. Even at her advanced age, Ibu Hera appears as young and energetic as ever, bubbling with energy as Carla Bianpoen explains.

To relatives and friends coming to celebrate her birthday, she talked about her concerns for the country, particularly the need for more action and better education.

Nobody would have thought the well-groomed elegantly dressed lady was something of a tomboy when she was young.

“I had short hair and dolls were boring (for me),” she told guests gathering around her last week.

The daughter of Doctor Latip and Siti Alimah, Ibu Hera (Herawati) was born on April 3, 1917 — 13 years after Raden Ajeng Kartini’s untimely death in 1904.

And she could be an incarnation of the national heroine. In the 25 years that she lived, Kartini too used her pen to lay bare her all-encompassing views on life, the state, racial injustice, gender discrimination and the role of arts.

And all while writing petitions for the advancement of women and discriminated against minorities. She became an inspiration for many long after she was gone.

But while Kartini had virtually no schooling (she had to follow the nobility’s tradition for girls and was relegated to the confines of her house at the age of 12), Herawati Diah, also born into the elite priyayi, fully enjoyed a higher education of the privileged elite and followed the way of life of the colonizer — a strategy which her mother consciously pursued for her children.

But it was just a strategy, for her mother Siti Alimah was a fervent nationalist and instilled in Herawati a national pride that was to affect the rest of her life.

As a staunch nationalist, her mother declined to send her daughter to study in the country of the colonizers, the Netherlands, as many of the elite did at the time. And so Herawati became the first Indonesian woman to study in the United States.

After a journalism course at Stanford University in California — between her principal studies of sociology at Barnard College, at the Columbia University in New York — she returned home in 1942 as the first Indonesian woman journalist to be academically trained abroad.

She became a stringer for the United Press International (UPI) newswire, joined Radio Japan or Hosokyoku as an announcer, and married BM Diah who was working for Asia Raya newspaper.
Her tasks as a wife and mother almost ended her career as a journalist, but her mother intervened, pointing out she had a responsibility to use her knowledge.

So she did, not only as a founding member and reporter of Merdeka newspaper from 1945, but also as the founder and driving force of The Indonesian Observer, the first and only English newspaper during the Asia-Africa Conference in 1955.

The word “merdeka” was the battle cry of those striving for national independence, while the English newspaper was aimed at improving communication for the people in Asia and Africa with the outside world.

When her husband became the minister of information in 1968, following his stints as Indonesia’s ambassador to Czechoslovakia and Hungary, the United Kingdom and Thailand, Herawati quit as a journalist. She assumed a new role, representing the country’s interests as a wife whose intellectual capacities, national integrity, international experience and multilingual abilities helped smooth diplomatic relations.

Amid financial crisis and political and social turmoil in early 1998, she joined Gema Madani (Echo of Civil Society), a civil society group which sought to launch Emil Salim, a one-time minister for the environment, as an alternative candidate for the vice presidency.

She was also among the women who took to the street demanding peace. In 1998, Herawati was among the many women who insisted that thousands of rapes did take place during the May riots before the downfall of former president Soeharto.

These women demanded then president BJ Habibie acknowledge that these acts of rape (against mostly Chinese-Indonesians) did take place, and insisted he express the government’s condemnation.

In the same year, she became a member of the Board of the National Commission on Violence Against Women, led by Professor Saparinah Sadli.

Herawati’s concern for the country’s education emerged again as she saw the need for women to play their roles in politics.

Together with Debra Yatim, Herawati founded the Gerakan Perempuan Sadar Pemilu (GPSP). In the course of time this organization became Gerakan Pemberdayaan Swara Perempuan and is currently working for the empowerment of women.

Not one to sit still, Herawati recently formed a group asking for the ministry of culture to be separated from tourism.

And when asked about her vision for the future, Herawati said she was concerned about the lack of history being taught to today’s youth.

“We must learn from history to be able to advance,” she said, emphasizing again the importance of better education.
As she moves from one activity to the other, Herawati Diah stands as a role model and fascinating source of inspiration for both young and old.

Carla Bianpoen