Tan Malaka (1896?-1949), an Indonesian Communist, played an important part in his country’s struggle for independence from Dutch rule.
Tan Malaka was born about 1896 in Minangkabau, Sumatra. His original name was Sutan Ibrahim. In 1912, his parents gave him the gelar (title) Tan Malaka. In 1913, he was sent for further education in the Netherlands, where he became interested in Communism.
Tan Malaka returned to Indonesia in 1919. He worked as a teacher before becoming a leading figure in the Communist movement. Following his support for a strike in 1922, he was exiled by the Dutch colonial government and went back to the Netherlands. There he stood for parliament as third candidate on the Communist list, but failed to receive enough votes to gain a seat. Later in 1922, Tan Malaka went to Moscow to attend the fourth congress of the Comintern, an international Communist organization, as the Javanese delegate. In 1926, he opposed the Indonesian Communist Party’s plans for a revolt and broke with the party.
Tan Malaka spent about 20 years in China, the Philippines, and other countries, where he disguised himself and used false names. He returned to Java in 1944, when it was under Japanese occupation, but still concealed his identity. After the Japanese surrender in 1945, Tan Malaka revealed his identity and rapidly acquired influence in the struggle for Indonesian independence. He was arrested and imprisoned, but was released in 1948. After an unsuccessful Communist uprising at Madiun that year, Tan Malaka took over leadership of the socialist movement and called for total resistance to the Dutch. In February 1949, he and an army unit clashed with another group of Indonesian soldiers, who were supporters of Sukarno, Indonesia’s first president. Tan Malaka was captured and, on April 16, 1949, he was executed.
