The Ali cabinet: PKI mass meeting with Umi Sardjono
De Locomotief, 1 June 1955: report of a PKI mass meeting in Jakarta where Aidit backs the Ali cabinet and urges peaceful election campaigning. Mrs Umi Sardjono, introduced as a non-party Gerwani member and PKI candidate, says she chose the PKI because it is a choice of being for or against the people. Date: the party's
Against the composition of the new cabinet: Semarang meeting rejects Burhanuddin cabinet
De Locomotief, 12 Aug 1955: a Semarang provincial meeting of mass and women's organisations rejects the new Burhanuddin cabinet and demands an all-party cabinet and elections on schedule. A five-person delegation to Jakarta represents workers (SOBSI), youth, women (Gerwani), peasants and ex-fighters. Shows Gerwani as t
Childcare centre planned for election day by Gerwani in Jombang
De Locomotief, 7 Sept 1955: the Gerwani branch in Jombang forms a committee, led by a Mrs Kenrati (uncertain), to set up a children's care centre during the coming general elections so mothers can vote calmly. Evidence of Gerwani's practical electoral support for women and childcare.
Central Java news: Salatiga election campaign schedule
De Locomotief, 23 Sept 1955, Central Java news: Salatiga campaign schedule lists Gerwani among parties with election meetings at the Gris Theatre (23 Sept afternoon), alongside Masjumi, PIR and PNI. The rest covers people's housing built in Salatiga.
Gerwani wants a democratic marriage law
De Locomotief, 29 Nov 1955: statement by Gerwani's central board (OCR partly garbled) calling for a democratic marriage law, citing the Maisuri forced-marriage case as proof that women's constitutional rights are violated. It urges women to be active in the Constituent Assembly elections and argues the 'first lady' deb
Gerwani on marriage: polygamy should in principle be forbidden
De Locomotief, 30 Nov 1955: Gerwani's central board announces its proposals for marriage regulation to the coming Constituante: marriage without coercion, free choice and equal rights; abolition of child, forced and purchase marriages and mistress-keeping; polygamy to be forbidden in principle, and if allowed on religi
Gerwani on marriage: full page with four-point marriage programme
Whole scrambled page of De Locomotief, 30 Nov 1955, with the fullest text of Gerwani's four-point marriage programme for the Constituante: no coercion, abolition of child, forced and purchase marriages and mistresses, polygamy forbidden in principle, divorce open to both sexes before a court and support for divorced wo
Lectures by Gerwani Semarang on women's rights and Regulation 19
De Locomotief, 30 Nov 1955: Gerwani Semarang held an evening of lectures by board members on women's rights and the inequality kept in force by Government Regulation 19 (1952 pensions for plural wives). Speakers recalled the organisation's help in vote counting and childcare centres during the elections. Text partly ga
Interpellation by communist MPs on foreign capital
De Locomotief, 28 Dec 1955: PKI parliamentarians Sakirman, Tjugito, Suwarti, Sumadi and Utarjo submit a written interpellation on foreign capital, claiming colonial-era extraction and restored monopoly under the 1949 RTC accords, with eight questions to the Burhanuddin government. Suwarti is a woman PKI MP; Gerwani is