An urban movement pushes for a peaceful solution

The UN ballot in 1969 broke every rule for genuine self-determination

An Indonesian eyewitness to the East Timor tragedy pleads for compassion

The inside story of East Timor's ballot for freedom

Fifty years ago, Indonesian nationalism was open to the world Goenawan Mohamad On 29 July 1949, a Dakota aircraft crashed near Maguwo, Yogyakarta, killing three officers of the Republic of Indonesia Air Force. A civilian aircraft, on a flight from New Delhi, it was carrying medical supplies donated by the Republic of India to the Republic of Indonesia. Its broken fuselage still bore the letters 'VT-CLA'. Reports suggested the Dakota had been pursued and shot down by fighter planes of the Royal Netherlands Air Force, which controlled the northern part of Java. A youth of 17 visited the crash site. He was not a photographer, but he wanted to record what had happened. He was a painter, and he made a drawing of what was left of the plane, hoping that it would stand as a witness: a civilian aircraft shot down without compunction by Dutch troops intent on using military might to take back control of Indonesia. Now, in 1999, that young man is recognised as one of Indonesia's foremost painters, Srihadi Sudarsono. But it has taken 50 years, until his first exhibition at the Lontar Gallery in Jakarta last week, for Srihadi's priceless collection of drawings of the battles and negotiations of the revolution to become widely known. Not all of his work has survived. Most of it in fact was lost in a fire that destroyed one of the buildings which played a key role in the events of the revolution. But at the Lontar Gallery I was privileged to see not only the remains of the Dakota, but also the figure of a guerilla fighter riding on a train, a group of Dutch soldiers ransacking a private home in Solo, the face of Bung Karno, the face of Moh. Roem, and a group of foreign diplomats at Kaliurang, Yogya, people who - thanks to the UN - were trying to deal with the problems that arose with the end of colonialism in Indonesia. Indonesia 1949, Indonesia 1999. Srihadi himself is maybe unaware of this, but someone looking at his drawings will easily pick up on a difference, a depressing contrast between then and now. Half a century ago, the outside world - together with a young and vigorous UN - came to the aid of Indonesia, a weakling in the face of overwhelming odds. Now all we hear is pointed criticism from the rest of the world, directed at a big and brutal Indonesia intent on destroying little Timor Leste (and failing in the effort). Indonesia then, Indonesia now. A half century ago the leaders of the Indonesian Republic noted with conviction and emotion in the preamble to their new constitution: 'Whereas freedom is the right of all nations...'. They stood firm in their belief that freedom was a right that everyone had to recognise because it was one expression of universal values. Now we only ever hear the phrase recited with indifference. For the last 40 years, the leaders of Indonesia have tried to proclaim that there is no such thing as universal values. We cannot be measured by 'Western' standards, they cry. We have our own democracy, we are unique, you know, you must understand Javanese culture, Asian values.... It's as though for oppressed peoples there is some essential difference between Indonesian military cruelties and, say, the tyranny of the Portuguese. The crash of a Dakota aircraft carrying medical supplies from the outside world. A number of foreign faces at a meeting in Kaliurang. In Srihadi's 1946 drawings there is no implication in the way foreigners are drawn that they are something to be feared, something weird or distant from ourselves. When he makes a drawing, Srihadi doesn't only record an event. As a soldier who knows what a war of independence means, he also records an attitude. In the lines of his drawings, we can sense that the Indonesian revolution - and Indonesian nationalism - contained no suspicion of the 'outside', was not closed to what was 'foreign'. From Srihadi we learn that the Indonesian revolution was not something 'inward looking', the kind of revolution that could emerge from, for example, the ideology and actions of the Khmer Rouge when they went about building a republic in Cambodia. Srihadi's record of events shows that even in the midst of its war of independence, Indonesia was an open book. The outside world came and looked, and skinny little Indonesia stood up boldly before it. On a street wall in Jakarta, around November 1945, the young independence fighters wrote in large letters, in English: 'Give me liberty or give me death'. They were not addressing Indonesians themselves. The words were those of Patrick Henry, an American, spoken in the face of British colonialism in the 18th century. By quoting them, the young Indonesians seemed to want to remind the outside world: the voice of an American patriot in the 18th century is the same as the voices of Indonesian patriots in 1945. How eloquent they were, how different from the gun-bearing, speechless wearers of safari suits we see all around us now. The outside world had to be convinced, because we were right. There was nothing that needed to be covered up, because we had no cause to be ashamed. Just like the conviction of the revolutionary troops of the 1940s who mobilised painters like Srihadi: they wanted to make a record of events, even if only in painting, at a time when they didn't own cameras. They didn't want to lose the traces of where they had stood. They were not thieves. They were making a history, one that also has meaning for people in a different place, at a different time, in a new millenium. Goenawan Mohamad is a poet and senior journalist. This article appeared in Tempo magazine, 10 October 1999. It was translated, with permission from the author, by Keith Foulcher (keith.foulcher@asia.su.edu.au). Inside Indonesia 61: Jan - Mar 2000

President Gus Dur's cabinet breaks much new ground. Inside Indonesia highlights eight of its 37 members. Abdurrahman Wahid (President) In all that has been written about Indonesia's fourth president, little has been said about one outstanding passion which dramatically distinguishes him from his predecessors, Suharto in particular, namely his long record of support for civil society in Indonesia and internationally. He created space for many community initiatives by lending his name and protecting them from official harassment. These included Infid, a key coalition of over 100 Indonesian and mainly Western NGOs concerned to promote a human rights approach to Indonesia's often repressive development programs. At Infid forums when the prevailing wisdom counselled compromise, it was often Gus Dur who would advocate the bolder course, particularly on human rights. East Timor was no exception. Gus Dur was the first prominent Indonesian to dialogue with Jose Ramos Horta, whom he met in Paris in the early 90s. In a bold move to improve people-to-people relations with Indonesia, Australian NGOs invited a delegation of their Indonesian counterparts to visit in 1987. Anxious about the reception they would get on issues like East Timor, the Indonesian NGOs asked Gus Dur to lead the delegation. As so often happened, he agreed but then had to pull out. But his endorsement was really all that was needed. The visit was a success. Suharto retarded Indonesia's development by repressing civil society. There are good reasons to hope that Indonesian civil society and Australia-Indonesia people to people relations will thrive during Gus Dur's term as president. Alwi Shihab (Foreign Affairs) Born in South Sulawesi into a well-to-do family of Arabic descent 53 years ago. He first met Gus Dur three decades ago when they studied Islam together in Cairo, and they have been close friends since. Gus Dur did not finish his degree, but Shihab did - a master's and a PhD, then another master's and PhD in the US, all in religious studies. Taught comparative religion at Temple University and Hartford Seminary in the US from 1993. Has written widely in the Indonesian media on the need for 'active' religious tolerance. After Suharto resigned, Gus Dur asked him to leave academia and support his bid for the presidency. Alwi Shihab spent the next 15 months as perhaps Gus Dur's main political operator. As one of several chairmen of PKB, he worked hard to bring together Megawati's PDI-P and Amien Rais' PAN into a loose reformist alliance. His older brother Quraish Shihab is close to the Suharto family and served as minister of religion in Suharto's last cabinet. Though comfortable in the West, the job of Foreign Minister will be a huge challenge for this gentle religious scholar. Erna Witoelar (Housing and Regional Development) One of only two female ministers (the other is Khofifah). Born in South Sulawesi in February 1947. Civil society activist with excellent international contacts. In 1991 she was elected chairperson of The International Organisation of Consumers Unions, the first woman from the developing world to hold this position. Chairperson of the Indonesian environmental umbrella Walhi in the mid-1990s. Indeed Walhi wanted her as environment minister. In 1998 she supported a half-hearted presidential campaign by former Environment Minister Emil Salim. Reportedly refused an invitation to sit on Habibie's cabinet in 1998. In 1999 she represented the general Indonesian movement of non-government organisations to the inter-governmental funding group for Indonesia CGI, to the World Bank, to the UN Development Programme, and as an appointed member to the Consultative Assembly MPR. She was also active in the poll monitoring activities of KIPP. Married to Rachmat Witoelar, former Golkar secretary-general (1988-93) and Indonesian ambassador to Russia, who remains politically active in the National Front (Barnas). Rear Admiral Freddy Numberi (Administrative Reform) Born 52 years ago in a village on Serui near Biak, West Papua/ Irian Jaya. Joined the navy in 1968 and became the first Papuan in the armed forces to reach senior officer rank. Is now the first Papuan to become a member of cabinet. In April 1998 he was appointed governor of Irian Jaya. Before that he commanded the naval base in Jayapura that covers Maluku and Irian Jaya. In his brief stint as governor he seemed more often swept along than in charge. No one applauded him when he assured demonstrators in mid-1998 that President Habibie had promised autonomy. On 26 February 1999 Numberi, who had often said how impossible independence was, found himself amid a 100-strong delegation to President Habibie that unanimously demanded independence. Threatened to resign in anger last October when the Interior Minister broke Irian Jaya into three provinces without consulting him. The breakup is widely condemned in Irian Jaya. In cabinet he has the opportunity to become de facto minister for West Papuan affairs as well. It may not be a job he relishes. Hasballah M Saad (Human Rights) Born into a poor rice-farming family in Pidie, Aceh, 51 years ago, he taught in an isolated primary school for 7 years before becoming a human rights activist for the next 15 years. He was imprisoned for 15 months in 1978 for criticising Suharto. In 1998 he was among the most outspoken Acehnese demanding the military be held accountable for years of killing and rape. In 1998 he joined Amien Rais' National Mandate Party (PAN) and was elected to parliament in the 1999 elections. He was also a member of the commission that implemented the new electoral system. The creation of his ministry suggests a new seriousness to tackle the cycle of violence of the Suharto era. Hasballah is a strong supporter of a federal structure for Indonesia. He will effectively be the minister for a democratic resolution in Aceh, but his interests extend throughout Indonesia. Khofifah Indar Parawansa (Women's Affairs) At 34 the youngest member of cabinet. She was an activist in the NU-related Indonesian Muslim Student Movement (PMII) while studying political science in Surabaya, graduating in 1990. Through the 1992 election she entered parliament (DPR) with the Islamic PPP party. In the March 1998 Consultative Assembly (MPR) session she read a PPP statement critical of President Suharto. When NU activists set up PKB in July 1998 to contest the 1999 election she moved across to that party with Gus Dur's encouragement. She became its main spokesperson on gender and other issues, in the face of religious conservatism even within her own party. At first she supported Megawati rather than Gus Dur for president, partly for feminist reasons, but she admires Gus Dur for his religious tolerance and acceptance of women in leadership roles. Married with three children. Marzuki Darusman (Attorney General) Born into a diplomat's family in Bogor, West Java, in 1945. Spent much of his early life overseas, learning fluent English. Graduated in law from a Bandung university. His determined work to build up the credibility of the National Human Rights Commission, which Suharto established in 1993, earned him a well-deserved reputation as a human rights advocate. However, he is just as much a Golkar politician, having sat in parliament since 1977. In the months before the June 1999 election he emerged as the only hope Golkar had of making itself acceptable to the public, but it was not enough. More hopes ride on this attorney general than ever before. He needs to clean up his deeply corrupt department, then prosecute key individuals of the Suharto era for corruption and for human rights abuse. Some fear that, his liberalism and human rights reputation notwithstanding, a lifetime career in Golkar might make it difficult for him to prosecute fellow Golkar members. Ryaas Rasyid (Regional Autonomy) Born in South Sulawesi in 1949. Will be the key administrator in this cabinet. His appointment reflects the urgency that the new government places on finding a non-violent resolution to dissatisfaction in regions such as Aceh, Riau, Kalimantan, Ambon and West Papua. Rasyid is a non-party-political bureaucrat highly educated in politics and public administration in the US (Northern Illinois 1988 and Hawaii 1994). With a team of academics he drafted the key legislation for the democratic elections of June 1999 in just a few months, beginning immediately after Suharto resigned. He led a government academy of public administration until appointed to a powerful post overseeing regional autonomy within the Home Ministry in July 1998. From here he also designed new legislation that will bring greater autonomy to regions outside Java, in an attempt to stop them seceding. He says the legislation 'is federalistic in all but name'. Inside Indonesia 61: Jan - Mar 2000

Wahid's presidency may herald the end of Indonesia as we know it. Michael van Langenberg The Jakarta Post on November 10 editorialised as follows: The central government must do away with its obsession with national unity and start giving real autonomy to the regions. The government must not offer half-hearted measures if it wants to spare this nation from disintegrating. Barring complete separation, the ultimate form of autonomy is federalism.... Ultimately, the real threat to disintegration.... comes from Jakarta. The New Order regime from its inception in 1966 constructed a state-system in which two factors predominated. First was an idealised nation conceived in the official motto of 'Unity in Diversity' (Bhinneka Tunggal Ika). Second were notions of an 'integralistic' state resting on 'family' principles, designed to protect an archipelaegic unity (wawasan nusantara). From its very beginning in 1945 there has been a crucial contradiction in the Indonesian state-system between ideal legal principles of regional autonomy, and the reality of an increasingly centralised national state. The collapse of the Suharto presidency in 1998 may mark the end of a century-long process of bureaucratic centralism in state building. That process began with the consolidation of the imperial state of the Netherlands Indies at the turn of the 20th century. In its later stage, Suharto's presidency came to resemble the imperial governor-generalships, supplemented with resonances of pre-colonial divine kingship. Suharto's presidency ended amid a massive loss of popular legitimacy. National government itself was perceived widely as corrupt and nepotistic, responsible for abuses by the military, greedily appropriating regional resources, and culturally arrogant. In the past decade, coherent independence movements emerged in several territories of the state. East Timor is now on the road to full independence. Aceh seems destined to achieve either independence or some kind of special 'federalist' relationship with Jakarta in the immediate future. Irian Jaya has just been divided into three provinces, creating increased local resentment against what is perceived as a further example of Jakartan imperialism. Increasingly coherent movements for regional 'autonomy' are now also active in the Moluccas (in two areas), Sulawesi (more than one!), Riau, West and East Kalimantan, West Sumatra, and Bali. Dispersal How will the new government headed by President Abdurrahman Wahid deal with these movements? Executive government is vastly weaker than a decade earlier. The legislature is now more powerful and more legitimate than at any time since the mid-1950s. It has successfully restricted presidential incumbency to two five-year terms, and made the president answerable to parliament once a year. The chairman of the Peoples' Consultative Assembly (MPR), Amien Rais, is a prominent advocate of a federalist state. Popular legitimacy of the internal security functions and political role of the military is now lower than at any time in the history of independent Indonesia. The ruling oligarchy of the New Order no longer dominates the economy to the extent it did prior to the economic crisis of 1997-98. Conditions are ripe for a significant dispersal of power within the Jakartan empire. Supporters of Wahid and vice-president Megawati Sukarnoputri present their political partnership as an integrating leadership 'duality' (dwitunggal), echoing that of Indonesia's two independence 'proklamator's Sukarno and Hatta. Like them, Wahid and Megawati reflect a partnership of Islamic identity and secularist orientation. Similar echoes of the earlier dwitunggal are heard in Wahid's stated preference for a federalist Indonesia, while Megawati has emphasised commitment to her father's vision of a centralised unitary state. However, unlike the symbolic regional duality of Java/Bali and Sumatra/'outer islands' of the Sukarno-Hatta dwitunggal, Wahid and Megawati constitute an emphatically Javanese variant of national political culture. The new cabinet has been designated the Cabinet of National Unity. In reality it is a cabinet of compromise and coalition building. It brings together conflicting political forces - rural Javanese Islam, modernising reformist Islam, secularist nationalism, federalists, unitarists, military professionals, internationalists, protectionists, liberal democrats. It reflects the broad coalition that Wahid built within the MPR in October to gain the presidency. In a sense this was less a coalition to ensure that Wahid became president than to ensure that Megawati did not. Once the Wahid-Megawati dwitunggal was in place, the cabinet had to accommodate the wide range of interests behind it. These negotiations saw the cabinet increase from Wahid's initially intended 25 to an eventual 35 portfolios. Policy coherence might prove impossible. Executive government instability is a distinct likelihood. Alongside 'reformasi', 'referendum' has entered the dominant national discourse. The former emphasises a new era of 'moral' politics, with national leaders seeking popular legitimacy as a matter of priority. The latter discourse, on display most vocally in East Timor and Aceh, has placed the debate about federalism and secessionism at centre stage. The 'Jakartan empire' is facing far-reaching structural change. Michael van Langenberg (mvl@asia.usyd.edu.au) is a private consultant and researcher on contemporary Indonesia and Southeast Asia, and fractional employee in the School of Asian Studies, University of Sydney. Inside Indonesia 61: Jan - Mar 2000

Indonesia and Australia over the long haul, as if ethics mattered