The context

Indonesia is in its majority a Muslim country, where religion, upholding ‘family values’ and sexually conservative ideas dominate but it has at the same time a growing sex industry.

Indonesia has no less than 200 localizations [1], legal or semi legal. It is estimated that the number of sex workers (Pekerja Seks-PS) reaches 120.000 to 450.000, and child prostitutes number around 40.000 to 150.000 (data survey of the ILO in 2004)

On the one hand, prostitution is rejected on the basis of various stereotypes, but at the same time it is accepted in society and taken advantage of.

According to the Indonesia Penal Code (KUHP Indonesia) article 296 prostitution is illegal. This is the legal basis for various kinds of regional anti-prostitution laws.

For instance, Regional Law article 1 on prostitution in Indramayu District states that “Prostitution is an action in which a woman submits herself to intercourse with the opposite sex and receives payment in the form of money or otherwise.

Further in article 5 and 6 it is stated: “Anyone whose action/behaviour can lead to the alleged prostitution…”

From these two articles we can see how the laws are aimed at women (prostitutes are women), and they also show that there is no clear definition of “prostitution” because a lot of words and interpretations are based on presumptions. Those articles further confirm that the nature or behaviour of a woman and the moral judgments of this can lead to the assumption that she is a prostitute.

Similar texts are found in several other districts in Indonesia, such as the Tasikmalaya District (West Java Province), the Tangerang District (Banten Province), the Mataram District (West Nusa Tenggara Province), the Bantul Districk (Yogyakarta Province). These regional bylaws are increasingly popping up the last three to six years, together with the reforms that replaced Suharto’s ‘New Order’ regime. As the political climate, particularly after the Gusdur presidency in 2001, has become more favourable to fundamentalist interpretations of the Islam, even more discriminatory regional laws based on religion (mainly Islam) and morality are put in place.

The ‘anti -pornography law 2008′ has become an additional legal basis to further regulate women’s bodies.

The law of regional autonomy No 22 (1999) and No 32 (2004) the implementation of the decentralization policy that resulted from the 1998 post-Suharto reforms, created a favourable climate for different kinds of sexist regulations. The hegemonic militaristic-development ideology of Suharto, the only ideology allowed during the New Order regime, collapsed. But as there were not enough ideological challenges or strong alternatives, political Islam became the only alternative since it could build on an already existing basis. Since the Suharto regime was also responsible for suppressing any attempts by Muslim fundamentalist groups to make Indonesia an Islamic state, the post-reform era created a favourable climate for them to grow. In my opinion it triggered the growing conservatism in Indonesia today. So those local regulations are the result of this particular political climate.

Under these regulations, several major localizations in Indonesia closed down, one of which is Karamat Tunggak in Jakarta which was closed in 2004 and turned into ​​a great Islamic Centre. Later, several other localizations closed also: Bantul (Yogyakarta) in 2007, Saritem (Bandung ,West Java) in 2010, Blitar (East Java) in 2010, Sunan Kuning in Central Java in 2010.

Currently the debate is on whether the largest localization in Indonesia, which is Dolly in Surabaya, should also be closed. Dolly was built in the colonial era and is, according to a newspaper, the largest localization in Southeast Asia, surpassing Pat Phong, Thailand, and Geylang in Singapore.

Dolly has a system of organized sex industry. The guesthouse owners, pimps, ojek (motorcycle taxi), taxi drivers, pedicab drivers, thugs, cops, and the military all benefit hugely from the work of sex workers. Dolly is considered to attract nearly 34 billion Rupiah (around 3,4 million USD) per month!

According to printed media, every Dolly customer is subject to a levy (called retribution) which is said to be managed by the local RW (neighbourhood official) for Rp.5000/hour( 50 dollar cent). Residents explain that a PS can get 4 customers every day. If the average tariff for one PS is Rp.20.000/day (2 dollar), the monthly amount going to the RW is Rp.600.000 or sixty dollar. Meanwhile, according to the local health centre data, the number of PS reaches at least 1200, meaning that the retribution alone can Rp.720.000.000 or 72.000 $!

There are also other charges such as a permit to set up a homestead, restart a business, placard levies of “TNI (Indonesia Army) no entry” and other charges. The pimps themselves, apart from getting money from prostitutes, also profit on daily selling beers at Rp.10.000 per bottle (1 $) et cetera. With all this income, of course the local government will think twice before closing it.

The debate on whether to close Dolly emerged within the governments, political leaders and religious organizations (Islamic) such as NU (Nahtadul Ulama) and the Indonesian Ulema Council (MUI). One side uses moral and religious logic, while the other side uses the logic of capital.

For the sake of a compromise so that his position would be safe, a governor said that he would close Dolly, but during a 5 years process. The government says this will give sufficient time to “retrain the PS to be useful for the community” and “turn them into good mothers for their children”. Of course he only wants to avoid any responsibility until he finished his term (within five years).

Another localization is in Bantul, Yogyakarta. The government worked together with religious mass organizations to criminalize/raid sex workers/prostitutes in order to welcome capital investment (usually under different kinds of local anti-slum regulations). Prostitutes are said to have brought disaster to Yogyakarta because as illegal residents they supposedly occupy places in order to live and work.

The Government conducted a survey among the public on the localization of prostitution, and according to this survey, many people are opposed to localization, although of course this is a one sided survey suggesting no solution to the problem. And sadly, it resulted in the local government drawing up the Local Anti-Prostitution and Alcohol Drinks Regulation No. 5 of 2007.

This law has become the reason to evict sex workers and people living around the southern coast from their houses in Bantul (Parangtritis), a place known for prostitution. Even though before the law the local government profited from those activities, and the pimps paid taxes to the local government.

The real reason for this ‘anti-prostitution drive’ is a new lucrative investment of RP. 100 Billion (100 million $) for the construction of tourist attraction for the very wealthy. This includes golf courses (68.2 ha), 35 hectares for the construction of villas and resorts, an allocated 9 hectares for the construction of five-star hotels and 11.5 hectares for the construction of recreational parks along Parangtritis’ beautiful beaches.

The Struggle

The most interesting aspects of the forced evictions and the dissolution of semi-legal localization was the resistance of the sex workers and the struggle of the residents in Parangtritis beach to maintain their homes and jobs.

The massive evictions started in 2007. We and several democratic organizations, together with sex workers and communities, created a human barricades to block the entry of heavy equipment meant to destroy the houses.

This was where the community began to organize themselves and formed a people’s organization. As for the sex workers they started to organize with Mahardhika’s support and last year succeeded to form their own local structure of Perempuan Mahardhika.

There are no exact figures about the number of sex workers in Bantul. Social agencies say the number is 500 people, the AIDS Eradication Committee (KPA) said the number of those who can be ‘observed’ is 250 people, while only 86 people have joined us.

Currently, the evictions on the southern coast of Bantul continue to be postponed due to the strong resistance of community organization there and the solidarity from other pro-democratic organizations. But the fate of the sex workers is under threat. Until now the government – through a local Civil Service Task Force (Satpol PP) and municipal police – often organizes raids, based on regulation No5 2007. Many women have been arrested, PS or non-PS, since this regulation also targets women who go out late at night and wear “sexy” clothes: their behaviour can lead to allegations of “prostitution”.

For that reason we conducted a paralegal training for PS and mothers, especially what to do if they get caught during a raid. Since many of them are illiterate and have no understanding of the law, the local police or required them to pay a fine of 200-350 thousand rupiah (20-35 $), or face imprisonment from 1 week up to 3 months.

Together with KPA and related NGO’s we organized several reproductive health checks for the women. But since the NGO’s who did this work, are only interested to add their statistic survey or spend their donor money, and not to really engage with the real problems of the PS, the result is we had difficulties to organize the PS without paying out their attendance on meetings etc. Now together with the local community organizations we are trying other ways to organize them.

In addition, we are currently thinking and discussing economic solutions (some sort of income generation), so they can “reduce” their “guests” (guests is a term used for a man who buys sex) and have an additional income outside their work as prostitutes so sex work will not remain their primary source of income.

On the issue of sex workers, we have difficulties in how to defend them . This is for various reasons. The mobility of sex workers (outside localization) is extremely high; they will “follow the money”. In the case of Parangtritis the pressing issue they face is the legal status of their land. They can easily be evicted and this uncertainty makes the organizing of the PS much harder. There is almost no progressive organization that does similar work as far as we know. Only a few NGOs organize sex workers.

So far only women’s organizations and NGOs who raised the issue of HIV/AIDS are trying to organize sex workers. But the views of these organizations and NGOs stills differ on whether prostitutes should be considered workers.

For example, the Indonesian Women’s Coalition (KPI), and Rifka Annisa Women’s Crisis Centre refuse to consider prostitutes as “workers”, because they say ‘sexual services’ is not a job but an ‘insult to women’. They use the terms ‘Women Who are being Prostituted’ or ‘Prostituted Women’ (PEDILA). Their position is that there are no women who would want to choose this job if society didn’t consider women as sexual objects and the economic system would treat women fairly.

Another case is the position of the Organization for Social Change Indonesia (OPSI) and IPPA (Family Planning Association of Indonesia). These two organizations are NGOs who raise the issue of HIV/AIDS. They also organize sex workers and have extensive regional organizations. Both of these organizations consider sex work as a profession/job, similar to the jobs of factory workers, shop workers, and others. By considering hem as workers, prostituted women will be more confident and no longer think of themselves as the lowest and most despicable human beings in the community. In addition, according to them, when they are considered as workers it will gradually eliminate the negative stigma of prostitution.

Related to the definition of sex workers or PEDILA, the two organizations also have different positions on prostitution. IPPA and OPSI say that locations for prostitution are work areas, comparable to factories for example, while KPI says the localization encourages prostitution and should gradually disappear.

In this regard, we agree with KPI on the use of the term ‘prostituted women’. But we also agree OPSI that criminalization of sex workers should cease and we agree with their call for fairer regulations—against the existing laws.

On the issue of localization, we argue that we prefer to request any localizations, and we consider that the existing localizations shouldn’t expand. In our opinion, the legalization of localization will only benefit the perpetrators of trafficking, promoting the sex industry, increasing the number of children PS have, and it will not change the status of women as sex objects.

We prefer a more comprehensive approach as support for the PS, aside from the whole economic transformation to socialism. Among others we argue for a special urgency fund in the national/local allocation budget for women in the most vulnerable and oppressive jobs: mainly prostitution. The money allocated should be for credit, education, skill-training, health checks, etc. Instead of localization we suggest that health care centres must be build around the areas where semi legal prostitution takes place, and the social/community workers specializing in health issues need to visit local neighbourhoods to check reproductive health and give training, etc.

Other solutions are something we need to obtain from this seminar.

Dian Novita (National Secretary of Perempuan Mahardhika)

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