Concealment in jungle ends after 34 years

Press, 21 December 1983, Page 20

Concealment in jungle ends after 34 years

NZPA-AFP Jakarta Two freedom fighters who had been hiding in the jungle for 34 years after Indonesia’s revolution for independence have come out and reported to authorities in Jambi (Central Sumatra) Province, the “Kompas” has reported. Musa Ismail and Lebai Hassan, lieutenants in the revolutionary forces, were reluctant at first to leave their hiding places but were convinced by another former freedom fighter, Ramli, that the war had ended. Ramli, a 55-year-old security official at Muara Kilis village in Sarolungan Bangko Regency, had met the two several times and became increasingly convinced that they were fighters from his war unit who were declared missing in 1949.

The two explained that they fled into the jungle in 1949 ahead of encroaching

Dutch forces and decided to stay rather than give up. They later joined the semi-nomadic and primitive tribe of Kubus, married Kubu women, and remained with them in the otherwise impenetrable jungle area of Jambi province. Jambi includes some of Sumatra’s densest tropical forests, home to some nomadic tribes who have spurned contact with the outside world. Reports frequently emerge from the sparsely populated province concerning villagers being disturbed by bands of rampaging elephants or attacking tigers. Once it was discovered that the two men were possibly freedom fighters, the military commander of Sarolungan Bangko Regency sent for a team from the Jambi veterans’ legion, including freedom fighters who had known the pair during the 1945-1949 war.

The team recognised the two as Musa Ismail and Lebai Hassan and they came out of the jungle on November 29. A member of the team, Zainuddin Abbas, also chairman of the local representative council, said that he was in the same unit as Musa Ismail in 1945 and confirmed that in 1950 a search order was issued for the two. Another member of the team and former unit-mate of Lebai Hassan recalled that in 1948-1949, the unit had a meeting in which it vowed never to surrender to the Dutch. Both men were recognised and accepted back by their former colleagues. However, Lebai Hassan’s younger brother and other family members failed to identify him, so efforts are being made to find his mother.

Musa Ismail’s relatives accepted him at once.