First, there was Sutarmi. Then there was Dipta
Anindita, a former teenage pageant queen from Surakarta. Then there was
Mahdiana, followed by reports of someone else. All the women are believed
to be wives of disgraced police officer Djoko Susilo, the former leader of
the National Police Traffic Corps (Korlantas) who is being investigated for
corruption.
Did the first
wife, Sutarmi, give permission for her man to take up these additional
wives? No one would be surprised if she had known nothing about the
marriages, though her permission would have been a legal prerequisite to
Djoko’s polygamy.
The three
additional marriages are suspected as Djoko’s means of covering up illegally
gained assets, according to the Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK),
which has uncovered several houses, plots of land and bank accounts.
A man must
prove he will be just and non-discriminatory toward all his wives. So, in a
harmonious polygamous arrangement he cannot, for instance, give wife number
one a house valued at Rp 1 billion, wife number two a house of Rp 3 billion
and wife number three the grandest mansion of all. Sooner or later
complaints will arise — around the inconvenient timing of the KPK
investigation.
We will have to
wait for months while the investigators figure out which wives own houses
one to 11, or whether all these assets are in the names of their cousins’
cousins’ wives, hence, making it increasingly hard to forge a link to Djoko.
As Indonesia
and the world celebrated International Women’s Day on March 8, Djoko
Susilo’s case suggests that it is business as usual — despite decades of
women’s rights campaigns.
Surely these
women — apart from Sutarmi — knew more or less what they were getting into
when the respected and aging police officer proposed to them — unless they
were really naïve.
It might have
been easy for officer Djoko to bribe the officials in charge of marriages
in Surakarta, Yogyakarta and other cities, and one may suspect he had
plenty to offer the families of the three women, to the point that they
could set aside any suspicions that he was not altogether an honest, rich
bachelor.
Djoko is
certainly displaying a creative way to disguise his ill-gotten wealth, if
the KPK can prove its case.
But at the
other end of the spectrum, the women accepting his proposals clearly
reflect an ever-available market of willing brides for potential suitors
who possess a lot of cash; regardless of whether they may become wife
number two, three or more.
These women
would not necessarily have come from poor families – poor is a relative
term; you may be considered poor if you own two cars but your neighbor has
two more.
As the
Constitution says, every citizen is entitled to improve their quality of
life, and that is what these women may have been doing, even if they knew
they were not marrying a rich bachelor.
In West Java,
the mountain resort of Puncak is famous, or infamous, for its women who
marry Middle Eastern men on a contract basis. Some have managed to secure
property and homes during a one- to two-year marriage; hence the incentive
for many more to seek such contracts, which may be clearer in terms of
their rights compared to other types of unregistered unions.
Since many
second and subsequent marriages are not registered, which leaves the women
concerned in a state of legal limbo, rights activists say a majority of
complaints reported to their offices come from neglected wives, whether
wife number one or six.
One tragic case
reported earlier this week, concerned a woman who was murdered and her body
mutilated, with her body parts being strewn across a toll road. In such a
case, one wonders whether the victim may have found out that her husband
was having an affair and then questioned him about it — with fatal
consequences.
International
Women’s Day this year carried the theme of “Gaining Momentum”.
In Indonesia,
the question may be how we can use the publicity surrounding recent crimes
and abuse against women to maximum effect.
In recent
months, there have been rapes and murders committed against girls and young
women; the blithe statement of a justice candidate who said rape victims
may have enjoyed the intercourse; the case of the Garut regent who divorced
his teenage wife by text message, saying she was not a virgin as he had
expected; and police reports filed by wives of local officials in
Tasikmalaya in West Java and Magelang, Central Java, who said their
husbands had secretly remarried and cheated on them.
All these cases
occurred as the global One Billion Rising campaign, which was triggered by
the gang rape and murder of a university student in New Delhi, gathered
momentum.
What unites the
campaign to bring an end to such cases — whether rape, neglect or cheating
on wives — is the solidarity among the activists for their female sisters,
who are still considered dispensable in so many countries.
Such
ill-treatment and crimes continue to be committed by men from all walks of
life; from the lowly vendor who mutilated his wife, all the way up to men
in senior positions.
With regard to
Pak Djoko, his innocence must be presumed unless and until there is proof
to the contrary, and we must assume that his polygamous arrangement was
harmonious.
Nevertheless,
some Indonesians are acquiring increasingly sophisticated ways to expand
and hide their ill-gotten gains. However, we should know by now that it is
easier to fool the law than to feign equal love to wives one to four. ●
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