Publication Date: Jan 2017
RRP: $39.95
ISBN: 9781925495140
Format: Paperback
Size: 153mm x 234mm
Pages: 336
Category: Herb Feith Translation Series

Basudara Stories of Peace from Maluku

Working Together for Reconciliation

Edited by Jacky Manuputty, Zairin Salampessy, Ihsan Ali-Fauzi, Irsyad Rafsadi and Hilary Syaranamual


‘All of the personal stories in this book have been conveyed with amazing honesty. It was not easy, to display deep personal feelings in public. More amazingly, all the contributors come from the communities which used to face each other with angry scowls. This is sufficient to make this book an historical monument.’ Gerry van Klinken

‘If this book was published to remember it [the conflict in 1999], then there is a spirit of emancipation: what can be done so that it is never repeated? What means are provided for the diverse society, so that people can work together and take steps towards the future, full of confidence?’ Rizal Panggabean


Between early 1999 and early 2002, in the Maluku Islands archipelago in Indonesia, Christian and Muslim communities engaged in a bloody conflict.

Various causes of this prolonged ethno-religious violence have been put forward. In this book, for the first time, participants in and victims of what happened speak variously of what they did and saw, of the effects of the violence on them, as individuals and members of families and communities, at the time and after, and of how they have sought to build bridges of peace.

‘Basudara’, a word evoking kith and kin showing care for each other, touches the central concern of the writers – the bearers of eyewitness testimony in this book – who pray for the growth of this caring spirit.

How, they reflect, can this idea be put into practice? How can such conflict be avoided in the future? What can the world learn from their experiences of violent upheaval?

Basudara Stories of Peace from Maluku is affecting, instructive and inspiring, and sheds a unique light on the world of Indonesia’s Maluku Islands.


Jacky Manuputty

Jacky Manuputty is a minister in the Protestant Church in Maluku, and Director of the Research and Development Agency (Balitbang) of the Protestant Church in Maluku (GPM). He is the Founder and Director of the Inter-Faith Organisation in Maluku (LAIM)....
Read More

Zairin Salampessy

Zairin Salampessy, usually known as ‘Embong’, is a graduate of the Fisheries Faculty, Unpatti. He was known as a pavement artist in Ambon from 1987 to 1992. In 1994, Suara Maluku newspaper asked him to draw caricatures and so he became a...
Read More

Ihsan Ali-Fauzi

Ihsan Ali-Fauzi is the Director of the Centre for Studies in Religion and Democracy (PUSAD), Paramadina Foundation and a lecturer at Paramadina Graduate School, Jakarta. He studied history and political science at Ohio University, Athens, and the Ohio State University...
Read More

Irsyad Rafsadi

Irsyad Rafsadi is a researcher at the Centre for Study in Religion and Democracy (PUSAD), Paramadina Foundation, Jakarta. He is responsible for the Ahmad Wahib Award Program in the same foundation (2013–2014). Irsyad is a graduate of the Syariah Faculty,...
Read More

Hilary Syaranamual

Hilary Syaranamual is one of the founders of Amansplus Ministry, which is involved in humanitarian activities. APM started in Malang, East Java, in October 1999, and has continued in Maluku from July 2005 until the present. Having lived in Indonesia...
Read More