Permai — the Badan kebaktian pendoedoek Atjèh-shii oentoek membina Asia, in Japanese Atjèh-shii-min-koa-hōkō-kai (“residency-Atjèh-people-elevation-of-Asia-service-association”) — was the mass organisation established by Resident lino on 20 January 1945 as the final and most ambitious concentration of Atjèhnese civil society under the Japanese war effort, into which the Maibkatra, the PETA militia, and the Kapal Oedara Atjèh (KOA, “Atjèh Air Corps”) were simultaneously dissolved. Named from the Malay permai (“fair, harmonious”) and built, in Piekaar’s reading, on the Javanese model of the Djawa-hōkō-kai of 9 March 1944, Permai was the institutional expression of the Indonesia Merdéka phase’s mobilisation of the entire population.
Foundation and statutes
“On 20 January, finally, as a result of the issue of the coordination of the war effort discussed in the 3rd session of the Atjèh Council, the establishment took place of the ‘Atjèh-shii-min-koa-hōkō-kai’ (Japanese lit. residency-Atjèh-people-elevation-of-Asia-‘service’-association) or ‘Badan kebaktian pendoedoek Atjèh-shii oentoek membina Asia’ (Mal. organ for assistance by the population of the residency Atjèh for the acquisition of Asia).” The statutes prescribed that the new organ “was to include all inhabitants of Atjèh” — a universal-membership mass body in the style of the Javanese Djawa-hōkō-kai established on 9 March 1944. “In this organ … the existing organizations ‘Maibkatra’, ‘Peta’ and ‘KON’ were dissolved.” The Resident’s installation speech was “in itself a specimen of venomous anti-Dutch propaganda”: “‘When we,’ it said, ‘do not ultimately succeed in winning this war, this means that for us forever and always the chance has been missed to grant Indonesia its independence’.”
Japanese control
“This new organ, which was supposedly born from the popular will, stood, as might be expected, under strict Japanese control. The Resident acted as patron and as such appointed the chairman and the deputy chairman. The appointment of the other board members was reserved for the chairman, but agreement with the patron was prescribed in this case. Also the regulation of the work program would, according to the statutes, be the task of the patron.” The work was divided into four departments — general affairs (sōmu), national defence (bōei), mobilisation of labour (kinró), and religious affairs (shūkyō) — with local branches (shibu) in every sub-division. “As chairman initially served Teukoe Nja’ Arif, the chairman of the committee of preparation designated by the Atjèh Council. Already soon, however, he made way for Teukoe Panglima Pólém Moehamad Ali … As vice-chairman was appointed Toeankoe Mahmoed, a position which clearly showed how the prestige of this former Volksraad member had declined under the Japanese administration.”
The four departments and their chairmen
The departmental leadership represented a deliberate balance between the oelama party and the oelèëbalang class. “As chairman of the defense department, in accordance with the patron, was appointed Hadji Moehamad Zainoe’ddin, whom we already came to know as a collaborator of Teukoe Panglima Pólém Moehamad Ali in the leadership of the welfare office. As chairman of the department for mobilization of labor served the former resistance fighter Teungkoe Sjech Ibrahim. As leaders of the department for religious affairs finally Teungkoe Moehamad Daoed Beureu-éh and Teungkoe Moehamad Hasbi (one should note the changed order, in which the names of these oelama’s are now also mentioned in the official documents).” The local branches, by contrast, fell to the gun-chó’s and aspirant-controleur’s — that is, to the oelèëbalang apparatus. “In contrast to the main board, where the extreme faction had the upper hand, the department boards were therefore under the control of the oelèëbalangs.”
The teishin-iin and the road to capitulation
The Permai statutes also provided for the creation of “special ‘shock’ groups for defense purposes, ‘teishin-iin’ (Jap. ‘teishin’, bravely going forward, risking one’s life or otherwise going out and ‘iin’, committee or committee member; Mal. pelopor) called” — a paramilitary reserve that supplemented the surviving PETA cadres now formally outside PETA but militarily intact. Permai’s establishment came too late to affect the course of the war. By the time of its second session in April 1945 the Allies were already bombing the North Coast, and within months of Permai’s first anniversary the Japanese capitulation arrived. Yet its apparatus — the unified oelama–oelèëbalang structure, the dissolved-into-but-not-destroyed PETA cadres, the teishin-iin shock groups — survived as the institutional matrix of the 1945–1946 “social revolution.”
See Also
- lino
- Maibkatra
- PETA
- Atjèh Council
- Teukoe Nja’ Arif
- Teukoe Panglima Pólém Moehamad Ali
- Teungkoe Moehamad Daoed Beureu-éh
- Teungkoe Sjech Ibrahim
- 20 January 1945
Source
Atjèh and the War with Japan, by Dr. A. J. Piekaar, translated from the Dutch original Atjèh en de oorlog met Japan (1949) (‘s-Gravenhage/Bandung: N.V. Uitgeverij W. van Hoeve; English edition), Chapter VII § 3, Chapter IX § 1.
Permai — the Badan kebaktian pendoedoek Atjèh-shii oentoek membina Asia, in Japanese Atjèh-shii-min-koa-hōkō-kai (“residency-Atjèh-people-elevation-of-Asia-service-association”) — was the mass organisation established by Resident lino on 20 January 1945 as the final and most ambitious concentration of Atjèhnese civil society under the Japanese war effort, into which the Maibkatra, the PETA militia, and the Kapal Oedara Atjèh (KOA, “Atjèh Air Corps”) were simultaneously dissolved. Named from the Malay permai (“fair, harmonious”) and built, in Piekaar’s reading, on the Javanese model of the Djawa-hōkō-kai of 9 March 1944, Permai was the institutional expression of the Indonesia Merdéka phase’s mobilisation of the entire population.
Foundation and statutes
“On 20 January, finally, as a result of the issue of the coordination of the war effort discussed in the 3rd session of the Atjèh Council, the establishment took place of the ‘Atjèh-shii-min-koa-hōkō-kai’ (Japanese lit. residency-Atjèh-people-elevation-of-Asia-‘service’-association) or ‘Badan kebaktian pendoedoek Atjèh-shii oentoek membina Asia’ (Mal. organ for assistance by the population of the residency Atjèh for the acquisition of Asia).” The statutes prescribed that the new organ “was to include all inhabitants of Atjèh” — a universal-membership mass body in the style of the Javanese Djawa-hōkō-kai established on 9 March 1944. “In this organ … the existing organizations ‘Maibkatra’, ‘Peta’ and ‘KON’ were dissolved.” The Resident’s installation speech was “in itself a specimen of venomous anti-Dutch propaganda”: “‘When we,’ it said, ‘do not ultimately succeed in winning this war, this means that for us forever and always the chance has been missed to grant Indonesia its independence’.”
Japanese control
“This new organ, which was supposedly born from the popular will, stood, as might be expected, under strict Japanese control. The Resident acted as patron and as such appointed the chairman and the deputy chairman. The appointment of the other board members was reserved for the chairman, but agreement with the patron was prescribed in this case. Also the regulation of the work program would, according to the statutes, be the task of the patron.” The work was divided into four departments — general affairs (sōmu), national defence (bōei), mobilisation of labour (kinró), and religious affairs (shūkyō) — with local branches (shibu) in every sub-division. “As chairman initially served Teukoe Nja’ Arif, the chairman of the committee of preparation designated by the Atjèh Council. Already soon, however, he made way for Teukoe Panglima Pólém Moehamad Ali … As vice-chairman was appointed Toeankoe Mahmoed, a position which clearly showed how the prestige of this former Volksraad member had declined under the Japanese administration.”
The four departments and their chairmen
The departmental leadership represented a deliberate balance between the oelama party and the oelèëbalang class. “As chairman of the defense department, in accordance with the patron, was appointed Hadji Moehamad Zainoe’ddin, whom we already came to know as a collaborator of Teukoe Panglima Pólém Moehamad Ali in the leadership of the welfare office. As chairman of the department for mobilization of labor served the former resistance fighter Teungkoe Sjech Ibrahim. As leaders of the department for religious affairs finally Teungkoe Moehamad Daoed Beureu-éh and Teungkoe Moehamad Hasbi (one should note the changed order, in which the names of these oelama’s are now also mentioned in the official documents).” The local branches, by contrast, fell to the gun-chó’s and aspirant-controleur’s — that is, to the oelèëbalang apparatus. “In contrast to the main board, where the extreme faction had the upper hand, the department boards were therefore under the control of the oelèëbalangs.”
The teishin-iin and the road to capitulation
The Permai statutes also provided for the creation of “special ‘shock’ groups for defense purposes, ‘teishin-iin’ (Jap. ‘teishin’, bravely going forward, risking one’s life or otherwise going out and ‘iin’, committee or committee member; Mal. pelopor) called” — a paramilitary reserve that supplemented the surviving PETA cadres now formally outside PETA but militarily intact. Permai’s establishment came too late to affect the course of the war. By the time of its second session in April 1945 the Allies were already bombing the North Coast, and within months of Permai’s first anniversary the Japanese capitulation arrived. Yet its apparatus — the unified oelama–oelèëbalang structure, the dissolved-into-but-not-destroyed PETA cadres, the teishin-iin shock groups — survived as the institutional matrix of the 1945–1946 “social revolution.”
See Also
- lino
- Maibkatra
- PETA
- Atjèh Council
- Teukoe Nja’ Arif
- Teukoe Panglima Pólém Moehamad Ali
- Teungkoe Moehamad Daoed Beureu-éh
- Teungkoe Sjech Ibrahim
- 20 January 1945
Source
Atjèh and the War with Japan, by Dr. A. J. Piekaar, translated from the Dutch original Atjèh en de oorlog met Japan (1949) (‘s-Gravenhage/Bandung: N.V. Uitgeverij W. van Hoeve; English edition), Chapter VII § 3, Chapter IX § 1.