Wiranto, who presented the lecture after a remark by Rector of ITB, Prof.Dr.Ir. Kadarsah Suryadi, DEA, asserted the importance of history as the best lesson in life. He began the lecture with a video that shows Indonesian situation after the resignation of Soeharto in 1998.

From the video, Wiranto explained that Indonesian Military could easily took over the government during the vacuum of power, but they did not do so for the sake of Indonesian people and the nation. They gave their support to the serving vice president, Bj. Habibie to take the presidency seat.

Wiranto said that Indonesia has gone through a long course of history. In 1908, Boedi Oetomo was established as a resistance against the colonialists. After Boedi Oetomo, Youth Pledge was expressed in 1928. And finally in 1945 Indonesia proclaimed its independence on 17th August. “Indonesia was established with hard fight after 3 centuries of colonialism, therefore we cannot waste it. Without unity, we cannot get our independence, fight the colonialist, and build this nation,” Wiranto said.

He encourages ITB students to prevent disintegration. Unity is important and it is stated in the second paragraph of the opening of UUD 1945 that reads “free, united, sovereign, just and prosperous.”

Confronting the Threat to Unity

Wiranto said that, in order to achieve unity, we will always confront threats. The threats are no longer traditional such as military war or colonialism, but modern ones. The threats are, for example, terrorism, cyber-attack, and narcotics. Collaborative threats are such as proxy war, illegal logging, illegal fishing, and human trafficking. Meanwhile, threats also come from the inside, such as hoax, hate speech, radicalism, and corruption.

Wiranto explained that one of the effort is the construction of cross border post as border infrastructure. Moving military base to borders in order to strengthen border and create new economy cluster. “After building cross-border post and its environment, community will gradually settle in. Transportation as the vein is built and now look very good,” he said.

Wiranto also mentioned about several achievements of Indonesia in international level, among them are highest public trust with 80%, second place for best investment destination, development stability, and better democracy index based on many safe regional elections.

“Other achievements are the success of national and international events, eid al fitr, Christmas, New Year’s eve, simultaneous regional election, Asian Games, Asian para Games, IMF-WB Annual Meeting,” he said.

Wiranto said that ITB has to have sense of belonging to this country and has the willingness to participate in national defense in order to make achievement, help reject and eradicate the spread of ideology that is in contrary with Pancasila.

ITB academic community also have to build tolerance, peace, and harmony in Indonesia. ITB has to prepare the human resource to be the agent of change and master science and technology by following the development of strategic environment both regionally, nationally, and internationally. “ITB academic community should possess a red and white soul, prioritizing the people and nation and not groups or personal interest.” He concluded.