For anyone that even cares
Peaceful Labour Demonstration Met with Violent Escalation by the Indonesian Government
Civilians in several cities in Indonesia have been protesting on the streets, in response to our House of Representatives insensitive and derogatory remarks amidst difficult economic climate.
It was supposed to be a peaceful demonstration led by laborers and university students, but our government choose to ignore and even violently escalating it with police brutality + shooting tear gas. What sparked a nationwide outrage was during 28 August protest in the evening, one of the armored police/soldier truck sped up intending to run over protestors and it struck over a Gojek driver (ride hailing driver, similar to Uber) that fell when crossing the road amidst the chaos. The truck did stop but decided to ram the gas and ran over him when he's trying to stand, with other protestors shouting for them to stop.
The Gojek driver's name is Affan Kurniawan. He's just 21 years old, the breadwinner of his family. He lived with seven other people in a cramped small rented room. He was not even participating in the demonstration, at the time of his death he was WORKING. He was trying to complete a food delivery order before he was killed.
This incident was documented clear as day with several videos from different povs. Here's the most prominent one.
In response to Affan's death, nationwide protests are held on the following day. (29 August)
The protests continued even today on 30th August and it keeps on escalating. The government is now trying to frame the protesters as violent anarchists, they're trying to use the same tactic as the '98 tragedy. They've been deploying provocators and intels to riot and burn public transport station, even going as far as raiding several (decoy) houses that belongs to members of the House of Representatives. They've also taken several hostages, reports of kidnapping as per 28 August is 400+.
They have been turning off electricity access in several parts of Jakarta and just greenlit snipers and soldiers to shoot protestors on the head with rubber bullets. There's already several victims.
They've also blocked access to TikTok live and even tried to erase/take down several of video proof of police brutality. Police are now sweeping several areas and civilians are alerting each other to be careful and to stay safe and not answer the door.
So yes. Please pray and check up on your friend that lives in Indonesia. I fear that there's going to be a military emergency implemented by our warcrime president. If possible please help save the video proofs because our government are cracking down to erase any proof of violence.
Here's more background information about the events that leads to the demonstration:
Video explanation from Al Jazeera that interviewed one of us: