Teukoe Nja' Arif

Properties2
tagsperson, achehnese, oeleebalang, republican, political
aliasesTeuku Nja Arif, Teuku Njak Arif, Teukoe Nja Arif

7 min read

Teukoe Nja’ Arif was an Atjèhnese oelèëbalang who, as chairman of the Atjèh Council under the Japanese occupation, wrote in favour of the Indonesia Merdéka independence idea, and who — after the proclamation of the Republic in 1945 — became the first head of Atjeh’s republican administration, only to be arrested by the Poesa at the height of the Ulama–Uleëbalang social revolution and to die in an internment camp in April 1946. Henri J. H. Alers’s Om een rode of groene Merdeka treats his rise and fall as the pivotal episode by which power in Atjeh passed decisively from the oelèëbalang class to the Ulama-dominated Poesa.

Wartime writings on Indonesia Merdéka

As chairman of the Atjèh Council, Teukoe Nja’ Arif was among the Atjèhnese figures who publicly welcomed Prime Minister Koiso’s 7 September 1944 promise of eventual independence. He wrote that the desire for freedom had for many years lain buried under Dutch imperialism, and warned his countrymen that independence would not be won “when the English and Dutch return” — a position that placed him, alongside the more equivocal Teungkoe Moehamad Daoed Beureu-éh, among the leading Atjèhnese voices of the wartime independence campaign.

Support for the national Merdeka movement and contact with Sukarno

According to Alers, Teukoe Nja’ Arif was, together with the prominent oelèëbalang Teuku Sabi, among those who lent early support to the national Merdeka campaign, seeing in it a possible counterweight to the growing influence of the Poesa within Atjeh. For a time contact between Atjeh and the nationalist movement on Java was limited to a telegram exchange between Sukarno and Teuku Sabi, a returning exiled oelèëbalang, pledging that “Atjèhnese blood” would be forged into “a fortress of steel” against any enemy from West or North. Teungkoe Moehamad Daoed Beureu-éh, by contrast, remained — in Alers’s phrase — characteristically “on the sidelines.”

Head of Atjeh’s republican administration

After the proclamation of the Republic on 17 August 1945, the republican authorities placed Teukoe Nja’ Arif at the head of Atjeh’s administration. His position rested, in Alers’s analysis, on the same delicate balance that made Pangeran Raden Adipati Wiranata Kusuma or the Susuhunan of Solo tenable figures within the republican constellation on Java at the time — a member of the old ruling class placed at the head of a revolutionary administration.

Arrest and death (1945–1946)

As the conflict between Ulama and Uleëbalang sharpened at the end of 1945, Teukoe Nja’ Arif proved unable to withstand the rising tide of Poesa power. To forestall official difficulties with the Republic he was granted sick leave on 14 December 1945; it did not help. At the end of January 1946 he was arrested by the Ulama as an “enemy of the Republic” and interned in a “republican” camp at Takengon, where he died on 6 April 1946. Alers treats his death as marking the definitive transfer of authority in Atjeh to the Poesa: he was replaced, in name, by the oelèëbalang Teukoe Tjhi’ Moehamad Daoed Sjah, but real power passed to Teungkoe Moehamad Daoed Beureu-éh, who had by then been named head of the Dienst van Godsdienstzaken (Service of Religious Affairs).

Significance

Alers places Teukoe Nja’ Arif’s arrest and death at the same point, in his comparative scheme of Java and Atjeh, as the 3 July affair on Java — with the crucial difference that on Java the coup against the Republic’s leadership failed, whereas in Atjeh “the design succeeded.” His downfall marks the moment at which the oelèëbalang class, already weakened by the killings and confiscations of the social revolution, lost its last foothold in Atjeh’s formal administration.

See Also

Source

Om een rode of groene Merdeka: Tien jaren binnenlandse politiek Indonesië, 1943–1953, by Henri J. H. Alers (Eindhoven: Uitgeverij Vulkaan, 1956), Chapter II §9 “Atjeh,” pp. 90–91, and Chapter III §14, p. 69.

Teukoe Nja’ Arif was an Atjèhnese oelèëbalang who, as chairman of the Atjèh Council under the Japanese occupation, wrote in favour of the Indonesia Merdéka independence idea, and who — after the proclamation of the Republic in 1945 — became the first head of Atjeh’s republican administration, only to be arrested by the Poesa at the height of the Ulama–Uleëbalang social revolution and to die in an internment camp in April 1946. Henri J. H. Alers’s Om een rode of groene Merdeka treats his rise and fall as the pivotal episode by which power in Atjeh passed decisively from the oelèëbalang class to the Ulama-dominated Poesa.

Wartime writings on Indonesia Merdéka

As chairman of the Atjèh Council, Teukoe Nja’ Arif was among the Atjèhnese figures who publicly welcomed Prime Minister Koiso’s 7 September 1944 promise of eventual independence. He wrote that the desire for freedom had for many years lain buried under Dutch imperialism, and warned his countrymen that independence would not be won “when the English and Dutch return” — a position that placed him, alongside the more equivocal Teungkoe Moehamad Daoed Beureu-éh, among the leading Atjèhnese voices of the wartime independence campaign.

Support for the national Merdeka movement and contact with Sukarno

According to Alers, Teukoe Nja’ Arif was, together with the prominent oelèëbalang Teuku Sabi, among those who lent early support to the national Merdeka campaign, seeing in it a possible counterweight to the growing influence of the Poesa within Atjeh. For a time contact between Atjeh and the nationalist movement on Java was limited to a telegram exchange between Sukarno and Teuku Sabi, a returning exiled oelèëbalang, pledging that “Atjèhnese blood” would be forged into “a fortress of steel” against any enemy from West or North. Teungkoe Moehamad Daoed Beureu-éh, by contrast, remained — in Alers’s phrase — characteristically “on the sidelines.”

Head of Atjeh’s republican administration

After the proclamation of the Republic on 17 August 1945, the republican authorities placed Teukoe Nja’ Arif at the head of Atjeh’s administration. His position rested, in Alers’s analysis, on the same delicate balance that made Pangeran Raden Adipati Wiranata Kusuma or the Susuhunan of Solo tenable figures within the republican constellation on Java at the time — a member of the old ruling class placed at the head of a revolutionary administration.

Arrest and death (1945–1946)

As the conflict between Ulama and Uleëbalang sharpened at the end of 1945, Teukoe Nja’ Arif proved unable to withstand the rising tide of Poesa power. To forestall official difficulties with the Republic he was granted sick leave on 14 December 1945; it did not help. At the end of January 1946 he was arrested by the Ulama as an “enemy of the Republic” and interned in a “republican” camp at Takengon, where he died on 6 April 1946. Alers treats his death as marking the definitive transfer of authority in Atjeh to the Poesa: he was replaced, in name, by the oelèëbalang Teukoe Tjhi’ Moehamad Daoed Sjah, but real power passed to Teungkoe Moehamad Daoed Beureu-éh, who had by then been named head of the Dienst van Godsdienstzaken (Service of Religious Affairs).

Significance

Alers places Teukoe Nja’ Arif’s arrest and death at the same point, in his comparative scheme of Java and Atjeh, as the 3 July affair on Java — with the crucial difference that on Java the coup against the Republic’s leadership failed, whereas in Atjeh “the design succeeded.” His downfall marks the moment at which the oelèëbalang class, already weakened by the killings and confiscations of the social revolution, lost its last foothold in Atjeh’s formal administration.

See Also

Source

Om een rode of groene Merdeka: Tien jaren binnenlandse politiek Indonesië, 1943–1953, by Henri J. H. Alers (Eindhoven: Uitgeverij Vulkaan, 1956), Chapter II §9 “Atjeh,” pp. 90–91, and Chapter III §14, p. 69.

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