Marchers return to parliament, this time for a corruption law stuck since 2008

Thousands of people marched on the national parliament in Jakarta on Thursday with one main demand: pass the law that would let the state take back assets bought with stolen public money. The bill has been sitting in parliament since 2008. Al Jazeera reports that riot police kept the crowd behind the locked gates of the building for most of the day. After dark, some protesters threw objects and police answered with tear gas and a water cannon. A police post and a motorcycle were set on fire, and several people were carried away on stretchers. Students marched in Yogyakarta and Makassar as well.

An asset forfeiture law does something a prison sentence does not. It lets the state seize the houses, land and cars bought with money taken from public budgets, so a convicted official, or the family, does not keep the profit. Some people at the rally went further and called for the death penalty for corruption. Lawmakers came out to meet the protest group, the United Pati Community Alliance, and promised to resign if parliament has not passed the bill by 15 December, according to its leader, Sopriyano.

The march was timed for the anniversary of last year's protests, which turned into riots in which about 10 people died and nearly 7,000 were arrested. The state prepared for a repeat. Jakarta police put 18,500 officers on the street and detained 65 people before the march, saying they were suspected "provocateurs". Chief Security Minister Djamari Chaniago said the officers were there to escort the marchers, not to limit free speech. About 200 students brought a longer list of demands: scrap the free school meal programme, which has been hit by corruption claims and repeated food poisoning cases, stop the "militarisation" of daily life, and bring food prices down.

Why it matters

The bill now has a public deadline attached to it, so there is something concrete to watch: whether the DPR schedules a vote before 15 December, and what the lawmakers who promised to resign actually do. For students and workers thinking about joining the next rally, the detention of 65 people before anyone had marched shows that the cost of turning up has gone up. The demands themselves are worth reading twice, because free school meals and the price of food, not abstract governance, are what put people outside the gates.