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ASIET NetNews Number 31 - August 17-23, 1998
Political/economic crisisAfter the talks what's the real situation? East Timorese caught in vise of violence Message from commander Xanana Gusmao New report on human rights in East Timor
Human rights/lawCrisis blights children's lives
News & issuesRights team discovers skeletons in Aceh Locals guard grave sites as troops withdraw Coup and other leaders kept in prison
Arms/armed forcesGrave robbers desecrate Chinese tombs Supreme Court dismisses Megawati suit Megawati gets the people's nod in survey Habibie's speech fails to sway skeptics
Economy and investmentReckoning at hand Military seeks new image Aceh jeers as troops pull out Indonesia's military madness
No takers for debt restructuring agency
| East Timor |
There has been a flurry of activity and announcements on East Timor since the resignation of Indonesian President Suharto, most recently with regard to the United Nations talks in New York on August 4 and 5. Many headlines greeted news of a possible autonomy agreement with enthusiasm.
An August 10, 1998 editorial in the New York Times was entitled, "Breakthrough in East Timor" -- a very well intentioned piece of writing, though perhaps over optimistic in terms of where matters actually stand at present: for one thing, diplomats involved in the talks say insist that "breakthrough" is much too strong a word to describe what has happened thus far. But the Times editorial only reflects a view that has received widespread attention in many places.
Nonetheless, Bishop Belo and other reliable sources in Dili said on August 20, 1998 that the situation in East Timor remains substantially unchanged. Asked if he saw any concrete results after the UN talks, the bishop said firmly, "Not yet." Two weeks earlier, Belo stated, "There is still intimidation and terror."
In late July there was a widely publicized announcement of Indonesian troop withdrawals from East Timor, with about 100 foreign journalists brought there for the occasion. In its editorial, the New York Times called it "a partial troop pullout," and again, the Times was far from alone in taking this announcement at face value.
The problem is that there is every indication that it is not true. Bishop Belo stated on August 20 that the troops were actually shifted to the western side of the island and brought back to East Timor in 24 trucks. "We must denounce this," Bishop Belo said on August 20.
A highly qualified independent observer was also in East Timor on August 20. This source said that on the surface in Dili, the situation is unlike anything it has ever been, with an appearance of openness. But reliable local people have told this observer that such appearances are deceptive. And in East Timor's countryside, there has been no change: "in the interior, no one has told the army about 'reformasi', the source added.
In light of the lack of change on the ground, one must be especially careful to avoid over)enthusiasm in one's approach to the results of the UN talks. On the one hand, it is encouraging that for the first time in the 15 years of talks under the auspices of the UN Secretary General, there is at least the possibility of substantial gains. On the other hand -- and this has been Bishop Belo's position for 15 years -- it is necessary to see concrete progress, not simply public relations gestures.
The August 5 communique outlining the results of UN-brokered talks between Indonesia and Portugal said that the two sides had agreed to "wide-ranging autonomy" for East Timor, (which might be concluded by year's end) "without prejudice" to "basic positions of principle." This last part leaves open the possibility of an eventual referendum on independence. These are positive elements, but it is necessary to be vigilant, not only on the ground in East Timor but also in assessing the overall political context.
The fall of the Suharto government and the ongoing financial crisis in Indonesia have increased pressure on the Indonesian government to boost its tarnished international image. What is certain is that Indonesia needs all the international good will it can muster. East Timor has been an irritant in its relations with the United States and many other nations, especially since Indonesian troops massacred more than 250 people at Santa Cruz cemetery in the East Timor capital in 1991 and after the Nobel Peace Prize in 1996. Indonesia will need at least $70 billion in foreign loans to begin rebuilding its financial house, and will need continued heavy support in the years to come.
Close observers of the diplomatic scene in Jakarta say that the official Indonesian position on East Timor may be in the process of shifting -- although the word "breakthrough" is too strong a way to describe it, some well regarded diplomats say we may be at a turning point -- but until there are concrete changes, it is hazardous to put one's faith in this or that signal. Foreign Minister Ali Alatas recognizes that a show of flexibility wins praise from foreign governments whose good will is vital. Announcements of troop withdrawals are similarly helpful, even if the number of troops remaining behind is so large that the withdrawals are meaningless in practical terms.
Alatas has pushed the view that autonomy is a final status for East Timor, not an interim status. The problem is that the parts of Indonesia that have been granted "special status" have received almost nothing of substance.
As stated before, it is unrealistic to expect that a transitional government like President Habibie's would be able to do more at this time: Going any further would antagonize the all-powerful military. On the more positive side, some observers believe that in time, an elected government (elections are slated for 1999) with political legitimacy, might be able to agree to real concessions, even a referendum.
If the process were to end where it is now, it would be a devastating blow for the people of East Timor, who, according to Bishop Belo, are overwhelmingly in favor of a referendum to decide their own future, even if it takes years.
The first order of business is to implement the points outlined in the UN agreement, which call for release of political prisoners and consulting the East Timorese in the UN negotiations. There is growing pressure to release resistance leader Xanana Gusmao, reflected most recently in an August 20 statement by Australia's foreign minister.
There also must be a strong push to demilitarize East Timor as quickly as possible, and establish a UN presence to protect human rights. Until such measures are in place, any claims of progress can have little credibility. And there is a strong need to monitor closely conditions on the ground.
Much depends on what happens in Jakarta in the coming months. People closest to the scene, both in the diplomatic arena and within East Timor itself, emphasize that Indonesia is unlikely to make major concessions unless pressed to do so: Maximum international pressure is needed if an end to East Timor's long nightmare is to be finally realized.
Contrary to popular belief, the United Nations has little power to bring about change in East Timor in the absence of international support, which is urgently needed. It is to be hoped that people of good will can join together for this purpose.
Uli Schmetzer -- On the athletic field of this coastal town, Indonesian soldiers armed with American-made M-16 assault rifles and wearing steel helmets stood in the cool shade of teak trees as they made residents of this troubled island line up under the hot midday sun.
The exercise was to teach the locals how to salute the flag and sing the national anthem during Indonesia 's Independence Day celebrations Monday, when Timorese must hail the country that invaded them. The scene was typical of military arrogance on this island, once coveted by global traders for its aromatic sandalwood and spices but now drenched in the blood of one-third of its native population, killed during a brutal 23-year guerrilla war against the hated Indonesian army.
Known as the Sandalwood island, East Timor floats on a pristine blue sea framed by a halo of green corals. But its 600,000 native inhabitants have become chameleons who learned to change colors and loyalties to survive a cruel occupation and an often just as cruel resistance movement.
The bloody war has left scars that will not heal easily. The conflict turned neighbors into informers, guerrilla supporters into traitors and revered leaders into turncoats. It has left people looking over their shoulders whenever they talk to someone. In East Timor, meetings are set up through a chain of intermediaries. Someone remains always on the lookout for spies. Conversations die the moment a stranger approaches.
In the capital of Dili, a small, drowsy place where everyone seems to know everyone else, a popular vegetable vendor, trusted by everyone, was killed recently in a motorcycle incident. In his pockets people found an ID card that identified him as an officer in Kopassus, the feared Red Beret Special Forces. The Indonesian unit was blamed for most of the atrocities on East Timor when the unit was commanded by Lt. Gen. Prabowo Subianto, the son-in-law of former President Suharto.
Down the road from the Liquica athletic ground, troops were poking their rifles through the fruit baskets of women. The prodding and pushing at bananas and papayas was not for weapons but for proscribed pamphlets urging people to reject the offer Jakarta made this month to grant limited autonomy to the troublesome 27th province it annexed in 1976, an annexation never recognized by the United Nations. The offer did not include the withdrawal of Indonesian security forces.
The little man in government uniform who watched the scene shrugged. "Even the bishop is now searched for publications," he said. Then he added in a whisper: "I wear their uniform, but what's inside," he said, pointing at his heart, "beats for os ermaos," literally, "the brothers," an affectionate local term for Fretilin guerrillas. The banned pamphlets exhort the Timorese "in the name of peace and liberty" to hold out for a referendum on the island's future, a vote almost certain to opt for independence rather than autonomy with integration.
Jakarta roundly rejects such a choice with the excuse that it will further divide the island and further inflame old grievances. Indonesia 's anointed governor on East Timor, Abilio Soares, said, "No problem has ever been solved by referendum. We prefer dialogue." But it is difficult, the Timorese say, to hold a dialogue with guns pointed at one's head.
Ask Pedro Fragoso de Oliveira and his family of six who cultivated a vegetable garden and ran a store on the outskirts of Liquica before a mob of paramilitary terrorists wearing ski masks and known as "ninjas" torched their thatch-roofed Atap hut and their store last month. The children were still inside.
When Oliveira lodged a complaint he was told that as a Fretilin sympathizer he had no rights. A similar charge could be laid against most Timorese. Next day a platoon of Indonesian soldiers turned up at the burned home, followed by another mob of "ninjas" armed with spears and bush-knives. The soldiers brutally beat up Oliveira and those neighbors who had rescued his children from the fire.
"Not so long ago the army would have executed him," said a local official named Koliati. "In 1975 the Red Berets took the town chief and five others, tied them up, marched them to the outskirts of the town and shot them dead. They left the bodies near the road covered with leaves and told us to shut up or else we'd share the same fate."
The news did reach East Timor's outspoken Catholic leader, Bishop Carlos Ximenese Belo, who won the 1996 Nobel Peace Prize for his courage together with Jose Ramos Horta, vice president of the national Resistance Movement of Timor. The bishop denounced the massacre. The result, however, was less than dramatic. "One lieutenant and one soldier were transferred--to the pleasure island of Bali," Koliati said.
In the minds of most of East Timor's 860,000 people -- 250,000 of them Indonesian settlers imported to boost Jakarta's claim to the island -- the greatest obstacle to peace is the presence of an army that enjoyed immunity for any outrage it committed under the Suharto regime.
The new government that succeeded Suharto's regime is eager to portray a more democratic Indonesia . Suddenly the armed forces find themselves accused of crimes. Earlier this month, East Timor commanders were ordered to ease some aspects of their occupation on the island.
Checkpoints on main roads are now unmanned, as army units have moved into the hills to monitor traffic from more distant vantage points. Dili is calm, but in every rural village, town or hamlet, troops remain garrisoned and visible, making East Timor a country under military siege.
Dili is a town of whitewashed colonial government palaces, a few new banks and supermarkets and the rusted hulks of shipwrecks washed up on pebble beaches. Now the island capital is a showcase for the peace offensive: Raids on homes have been reduced to a minimum. Two soldiers are on trial for killing a native woodcutter, and a high military official has apologized for recent excesses.
In return, Fretilin's jailed but much revered leader, Jose "Xanana" Gusmao, has sent a directive from his cell in Jakarta that negotiations for a settlement being held among Portugal, Indonesia and the UN should not be jeopardized. The war has gone into limbo.
"Our fight is not with the people of Indonesia," Gusmao's sister Armandina said in an interview. "Our fight is with (the Indonesian army). I feel pity for the Indonesian people who have less and less to eat. For them, every day is becoming a problem, and we are like a pebble in their shoe. So why don't they get rid of the pebble and stop limping?"
Armandina, the fourth of seven Gusmao sisters and two brothers, is a charismatic woman. She still battles the nightmares of five months in military detention during which she was abused in a way she won't discuss. "It would've been better had they beaten me to a pulp," she said.
Abuse in East Timor takes many forms: The hooded ninjas who burn, beat and terrorize suspected Fretilin supporters. The standard beating and torture of detainees. The injection of schoolgirls and women with anti-fertility drugs to keep down the native population, a sacrilege for the staunchly Catholic Timorese, who often have 10 and more children. The sudden raids on homes to search for guerrillas. The manhandling and fondling at checkpoints.
"I had all my toenails pulled out, one by one," said Joao who was sent in 1980 with 3,500 other Fretilin sympathizers to the penal island of Atauro off Dili. "They just dumped us there. There were no doctors, and the only food (was what) the local tribes gave us. I helped to bury 10 to 12 of my comrades a day in the first months. I was lucky. Toenails grow back."
Joao still lives on Atauro even though he could go home now. He has no intention to return to the mainland unless East Timor is free. Or if "os ermaos ask for me," he added with a wink. "There is not a family in East Timor which has not had at least one member killed by the (Indonesian) military. How can we accept autonomy under the continued presence of this military?" said Manuel Vargas Carrascalao, one of the island's patriarchal figures.
Carrascalao is a sometime politician, a coffee plantation owner and currently the de facto voice of Fretilin, a movement that has split into five parties, though all five still recognize Xanana Gusmao as their leader.
Carrascalao, a craggy-faced man with a diplomat's ready smile, has lived a charmed life: He was once arrested after protesting against a soldier who had killed a woman to steal her jewelry. Twice a truck tried to run him down. Another time, a bullet went through his car windshield. He was told to leave the country and refused. In 1991, he was ordered at gunpoint to stop the search for his daughter among the corpses of student mowed down by troops in Dili's cemetery. He refused and later found out she had escaped the shooting. "I guess I was spared because God wants East Timor to be independent," he said.
In a country where people's loyalties are tested often, Carrascalao's critics say he is a political opportunist who sided with the Portuguese during the civil war against Fretilin, supported the Indonesians, joined their parliament and then became a fervent nationalist clamoring for a referendum on the future. "I remember him shouting in parliament in 1989 `We will never, never allow a referendum in East Timor,' " said Florentino Sarmento, head of East Timor's human-rights organization.
An economist, Sarmento favors autonomy with federation in some distant future. He scoffs at Fretilin promises of riches from offshore oil deposits once the country is independent. "Economically, independence would be a disaster. We don't have technology or human resources. Independence would not help the poor people but allow politicians to travel and live well on government funds. As for the oil, it is offshore in international waters, and we would have to share it with Australia."
A pragmatist, Sarmento has won few friends with his accusation that not only the Indonesian army but also the guerrillas committed atrocities during the war, brutally killing alleged traitors and collaborators. "They forced people to eat their tongues and then killed them. They shot fathers in front of their families and asked people to dig their own graves, then gouged out their eyes and made them find their graves," he said.
"Now some of these guerrilla leaders eat a lot of rice and make a lot of rupiahs. Some hold senior positions in the civil service, and others are honored campus professors. It's best to let bygones be bygones. There are too many skeletons in the cupboard." Sarmento has his share of critics in this country of many tribes, many languages and many opinions. Some say he used to be a loyal nationalist but turned integrationist and a lackey of Jakarta.
There is one issue that unites nearly everyone: The Indonesian troops must go before any compromise can be reached. The withdrawal this month of 1,300 combat soldiers -- from a force estimated at 15,000 on East Timor -- is widely seen as a sham.
Watched by silent natives from behind iron-spiked fences, the troops embarked at Dili harbor as newly armed military personnel arrived billed as "doctors, advisers and agrarian experts." "The soldiers simply changed their shirts and put on new insignias," the local official Koliati said. Added Carrascalao: "These withdrawals have gone on for years. We're tired of them. They go out the front door, change uniforms and come in the back door."
Indonesia has signaled no intention to weaken its security forces on East Timor, notorious for its militant inhabitants. The little country lost about one-third of its population in the guerrilla struggle against Japan in World War II.
Once the Japanese were defeated, the Timorese survivors picked up the discarded Japanese guns and turned them on their Portuguese colonial masters. When the Portuguese withdrew from East Timor, after 460 years, the various factions and tribes fought a civil war. Fretilin won. But before the liberation movement could settle into the colonial palace, Indonesia invaded in 1975 and started the mother of all wars.
Today, Timorese nationalists and students refuse to accept anything short of a referendum to determine their future. The war of guns has turned into a war of words. "We were prepared to fight for six years in 1975 and we fought for 23 years. We can fight for another 23 years," said Maria Alves, a member of the parliament Jakarta has set up in Dili.
In the past, Alves could have been labeled a collaborator, and her tongue would have been cut out. But today her fervent support for independence is fashionable. "The more people die the more the living want their liberty," she said.
Everyone now rides the independence bandwagon, yet few public figures on East Timor can boast a clean track record, and only two "men of honor" have remained untarnished. One is Bishop Belo. His Roman Catholic Church is spiritual home to 85 percent of the population. Its devotion to a "peace with dignity" has been unquestioned. His clerics face constant raids on their homes by troops searching for documents and hidden guerrillas. "As Christians, we cannot refuse shelter to those in need," said one young priest.
Perhaps to placate fears that a Muslim Indonesia will eventually tamper with East Timor's Catholic faith, former President Suharto built an 85-foot-tall statue of Christ the Redeemer on a cliff overlooking Dili Bay and came to inaugurate it. One problem: The Dili Christ, designed by a Muslim architect, faces Mecca. Few of the faithful trek up the cliff to visit him.
The other man of respect is the enigmatic Xanana Gusmao, a former poet and a civil servant in the Portuguese administration. Since he was betrayed and captured in 1992 at a house in Dili, Gusmao has assumed the aura of a Nelson Mandela in East Timor.
In this region where three tribes may live on one island but speak three languages within walking distance of one another, Gusmao's charisma transcends language barriers, the jealousies of village shamans and the nagging differences among the five political parties that split his Fretilin movement. Every politician uses a Gusmao anecdote to boost his or her credibility. Carrascalao says the rebel leader told him he wants a referendum. Sarmento says Gusmao wants a referendum in 10 years. Gov. Soares says he was the only one to travel to Jakarta to plead for Gusmao in 1992.
Perhaps Sarmento has the best credentials: He says he lent Gusmao his own car, which the Fretilin commander drove to the rendezvous the day he was captured. The car is still in the police compound. "People love Xanana because he is the only one who has remained coherent and stuck to his principles," mused his sister.
Fellow Countrymen -- August 20 is the National Day of our glorious Armed Forces of National Liberation of East Timor, FALINTIL. Today, as in the future, the 20th of August will prevail in our minds as the day to remember all those who fell in defence of the sacred land of East Timor.
FALINTIL owes its guiding moral strength and political capacity to Nicolau Lobato, the insightful FALINTIL Commander-In-Chief whom, during the First three years, led the Armed Resistance against the coward invasion by General Suharto's murderous armed forces.
From Domingos Ribeiro to Kaliti, from Sebastipo Sarmento to Coru-Ato, from Rama Hana to VenGncio Ferraz we have recall the tens of thousand steadfast FALINTIL soldiers who gave their lives for the Maubere Motherland. Amongst them, Nino Konis Santana and Alex Daitula stand out. They were unbreakable in fulfilling their duty to keeping the National Resistance flame burning and alive.
Nino Konis Santana -- an example of dedication and perseverance, an example of a profound sense of duty and sacrifice clearly demonstrated during the last moments of his life whilst suffering from the bullets he carried in his body and neck.
Alex Daitula -- a brave Commander, a fear amidst the enemy ranks. Devoted and totally committed to his duties. A small man with a great soul.
I ask for a minute of silence in a tribute to our heroes. Their souls now live in Matebian with our ancestors, embellished with feathers in their heads, waving the swords of war and demanding that we continue their work.
A minute of silence to share this moment together and to worship them by demonstrating our deep respect and admiration and our total commitment to the ideal of the Liberation of our Motherland and the Maubere People.
I have been meaning to address all the companheiros in the Diaspora since the holding of the East Timorese National Convention. I do so today whilst celebrating the National Day of the glorious FALINTIL.
I wish to greet in general all our fellow countrymen abroad and, in particular, those who, in one way or the other, made it possible for the Convention to be held in Peniche [Portugal].
Ever since the FALINTIL soldiers became aware that they were giving their lives for East Timor, the Motherland of all East Timorese, they ceased their political subordination to a party and turned the struggle into a truly national Resistance.
This feature has guided the fierce resistance of our People and the political result was the setting up of CNRT.
The CNRT is proof of the commitment of all the East Timorese for National Unity as the sine qua non condition for victory -- a victory which is ever closer.
National Unity does not exclusively mean establishing political links between the East Timorese. National Unity demands that we engage into further efforts to reinforce the principles of the organisation, that we engage into further efforts to share common concerns and that we engage into further efforts to create a climate of greater understanding, greater mutual support and greater commitment towards an individual and collective improvement.
We are facing an historic challenge that demands for an in- depth study of problems and seriousness in the analysis. Let us try to avoid underestimating our capability of thinking and deciding, and eradicate excessive euphoria from our minds. Both harm our intent to give our best to serve our People. The negotiation process will be difficult, given that the colonialist government of Jakarta maintains its stand on the illegal annexation of our Motherland. The negotiation process will also be difficult because, unfortunately, there are still East Timorese who keep their backs turned against the future and look towards autonomy as an important condition to save themselves and to save, as they think, what they now own at the cost of our People's suffering.
Those, in and outside East Timor, who passionately defend the autonomy proposal [recently espoused by the Habibie government], feel certain that the spirit of Orde Baru [New Order] will protect them. Also they feel, that by supporting autonomy, they will be protected by the murderous Indonesian troops currently occupying East Timor.
They also think that autonomy will give them a greater power of ownership in East Timor and enable them to explore it at their own free will, forgetting that Indonesia itself is facing great social problems resulting from its serious economic crisis.
Guided by a profound ego which hinders them from thinking correctly, among these East Timorese there are also those who still demonstrate the intolerable pride of a sore looser thereby proving that they are defending their own interests rather than those of the People. A stupid pride which blinds them and obstructs them from recognising that things have changed; they continue to advocate Indonesian arguments without thinking that within the process of political reforms in Indonesia the arguments used by the Suharto regime are losing consistency and value.
In essence, they argue that a referendum may lead to a new civil war. But when I tell them that the same may occur if autonomy is imposed as a final solution, they do not accept it. I know what they are thinking. They still embrace the idea that ABRI will keep their current military presence and, whenever necessary, will ask for a reinforcement to guarantee what they call peace and tranquillity in the territory. The recent terror and provocative manoeuvres prove that their autonomy theory is a life insurance which protects their property and ensures new and profitable businesses because, as defenders of integration they have had the privilege of resorting to the occupation forces to oppress our People.
The defence of the so-called autonomy is in the hands of Jakarta and, to save the persatuan dan kesatuan (national unity), ABRI will be mobilised to subdue the insurgents. Some East Timorese refuse to allocate some of their time to reflect upon the economic crisis in Indonesia and are unable to understand the complex process of reforms and the yearnings of Indonesian society.
They are the poor tools of colonialism with no character and even poorer are those who encapsulate in their individual pride and refuse to accept that they were wrong and defended that which is false and unfair.
We have a lot of work ahead of us. I ask all of you to reinforce National Unity by establishing contact with all our mislead brothers, clarifying to them the importance of East Timorese unity and looking towards the future of freedom which awaits us.
Their political recovery depends on us, on those who often have too much pride and feel as the guardians of truth because we have defended the People's right to self-determination and national independence. I reaffirm that it depends on us -- on all of us.
It depends on us because our political attitudes will influence a gradual perception that we are prepared to create a spirit of genuine national reconciliation. It depends on us because only an intensification of efforts to establish contacts and exchange opinions with our failed brothers can enlighten them and guarantee that the referendum will not be a threat to anyone; that we are all committed to save East Timor from further disagreement because we are determined to ensure a true longlasting peace for our People. We are committed to develop East Timor and to ensure the building of the democratic foundations in our Motherland for a brighter future for the coming generations.
We face an historic challenge. A challenge within each one of us. The present political context demands for a greater availability from within our hearts. Whenever I have to speak about this I feel belittled and embarrassed with myself. Firstly, because I anticipate reactions, as a result of the squealing that has reached me. Secondly, because it may seem pretentious of me to show up as a judge of my brothers' behaviour. And thirdly, given the coincidence that I am no sea of virtues.
Both in East Timor and within the Diaspora, certain work methods are leading to the self-isolation of organizations and groups. This has led to groups working competitively against one another rather than realising the common goal of independence.
This competitive spirit brings about problems between groups which withhold information from each other on their activities and allow the settling in of mistrust and rumours that disseminate and inflate in an uncontrolled way.
I must acknowledge that the Resistance has accommodated many forms of participation according to the different political conditions we lived throughout all these years, which have, in one way or the other, enabled such behaviour.
This spirit of independence of small groups had its advantages but also carried disadvantages given the lack of capability from inside our Motherland to control them and bring them under one umbrella. Requests made to those abroad were always uncontrollable.
The formation of CNRT [National Council of Timorese Resistance], this year, did not end in Peniche (Portugal). The CNRT must be activated and given new organizational features and a new political attitude to enable a more productive, rational and proficient outcome. Thus we can avoid wasting energy and prevent competition between groups.
And us, those who are inside, could have avoided colliding with each other, in FALINTIL and in the clandestine organization, if during our own contacts with the groups abroad we had not been led by the spirit of proving who managed to get the most or who helped the most.
This method enabled the setting up of small groups within the clandestine organization, sometimes beyond the control of those in charge, because people wanted to prove they had their own contacts with those abroad or they were more capable.
We are trying to re-organize the internal structure of the Resistance and I urge the East Timorese communities abroad to change their work methods, to set up units abroad that may keep direct contact with those in charge inside the territory. Thus we can foster a spirit of cooperation between those inside East Timor and those groups abroad.
I urge all to be aware of the present moment and to correct that which was allowed by conditions in the past. To all I urge to develop a climate of trust, of greater support and understanding.
Inside our Motherland we are initiating political education on the referendum and all its political implications, both past and to come. Inside our Motherland we are to initiate political education for a better understanding and comprehension of what a period of transition means as well as its political implications so that our People can understand and get prepared for every step of the process and be the agent, rather than the object, which determines such a process. To the companheiros abroad we ask you to think about the mistakes which have led to misunderstanding between individuals and groups. We need to make greater political compromises which will make us strong and invincible because, the struggle continues on all fronts. We got used to thinking that the fronts of the struggle were the political and diplomatic fields and that of the Armed and Clandestine Resistance. With the progress made in the process of our struggle we have to be aware that broader fronts have been opened up: those which deal with our own behaviour and the relationship between us, between all of us. We must start to think that independence does not merely mean the possibility to return to the Motherland. We must start to assess the enormous difficulties ahead of us, from the transitional period to the referendum and the initial years of independence.
I am not stirring up an exaggerated optimism. I am requesting that we meditate in-depth on the future. Maybe there are some who are thinking on what they might become, on what they will demand for him/herself as compensation to participate in the government [when East Timor is independent]. We should rather be thinking on the complexity of the situation which awaits us. From now on, we should rather be thinking on the real contribution to avoid worsening the situation with irrelevant problems.
These irrelevant problems will only destroy the common effort to create an atmosphere of harmony and a will to reconstruct the Motherland and the Nation. From now on the common goal can only be achieved if we educate ourselves politically.
Lastly, I urge all of you to reinforce your trust in the Leadership of the Struggle and support the members of the National Political Commission in the implementation of their tasks so that we can quickly end all the suffering of our People.
To resist is to win! The victory is certain and inevitable!
In Prison, 12 August 1998. Kay Rala Xanana Gusmao Commander-in-Chief of FALINTIL
The East Timor Human Rights Centre (ETHRC) today launched a new report on the current human rights situation in East Timor. The report documents human rights violations between January and June 1998 and assesses the Habibie's government's response to the human rights violations and its efforts to move towards a resolution of the conflict.
Maria Brett, Executive Director of the ETHRC said: "Even with the greater freedom East Timor is experiencing, and the gestures of good will offered by President Habibie, serious and systematic human rights abuses are continuing in East Timor. There has not been a noticeable reduction in human rights violations, contrary to earlier indications that violations may have been decreasing."
While welcoming steps already taken by President Habibie such as the release of some East Timorese political prisoners and the greater freedom of speech being allowed in East Timor, the ETHRC report concludes that the government of Indonesia needs to go much further.
"The ETHRC is concerned no further progress has been made on releasing East Timorese political prisoners. It is believed over 100 political prisoners remain in detention in Indonesian prisons and East Timorese people remain at risk of arbitrary arrest and torture for their political activities" Ms Brett said.
"The bold expressions of new-found freedoms, particularly on the part of the East Timorese youth, have not been without repercussions. Some people have been arbitrarily arrested, tortured and even killed in the month of June. Tension remains high and there are widespread intimidation and pressure tactics on the part of the Indonesian military, intended to discourage the youth from expressing their views" Ms Brett said.
The ETHRC also assesses claims by the government of Indonesia that the military presence in East Timor is being reduced. "We are concerned that the withdrawal of 1,000 Indonesian troop from East Timor may not represent a genuine reduction in the military presence in East Timor. Unless there is international verification of the withdrawals, preferably through UN monitoring, claims that the military presence in East Timor is being reduced should be treated with caution."
The report welcomes the opportunity created by the latest round of talks between the governments of Indonesia and Portugal under UN auspices but cautions that certain steps must be taken for there to be real progress towards a solution: "The ETHRC believes the dialogue will only move forward if Xanana Gusmao, the jailed leader of the East Timorese Resistance, is released, to enable him to participate in the discussions for a solution."
The report also proposes concrete steps which can taken by the government of Indonesia and the international community to improve the human rights situation in East Timor, and to move towards a lasting and internationally acceptable solution to the conflict. "Such a solution will only be possible if it is based on respect for human rights, and if it reached by consultation with the East Timorese people."
"Throughout this process, it is absolutely fundamental that the wishes of the East Timorese people are considered. This means engaging the recognised East Timorese leaders, including Xanana Gusmao, in dialogue but ultimately, it means direct consultation with the East Timorese people through a UN-supervised referendum" Ms Brett said.
| Political/economic crisis |
Andrew Marshall, Jakarta -- The air at the Bekasi municipal dump on the eastern fringes of Jakarta is thick with flies and the stench of a million tonnes of garbage. Ferreting among the mounds of stinking debris, their clothes, hands and faces smeared with grime, are hundreds of Indonesian children who should be at school.
Indonesia's new school year began on July 20, but almost half of the country's children failed to turn up. A sudden plunge into deepening poverty has destroyed the chance of an education for millions of children and cast a shadow over the future of the world's fourth most populous nation.
With almost half of Indonesia's 200 million people expected to be living below the poverty line by the end of 1998 as a crippling economic crisis fuels spiralling prices and a collapse in incomes, school is becoming a luxury many cannot afford. For a growing number of children, work is the only way to survive.
At Jakarta intersections choked with exhaust fumes, children as young as four and five weave through the traffic, begging or banging home-made tambourines for money. Some are so small their faces don't reach high enough to look into car windows, and only their outstretched hands can be seen.
In dimly lit nightclubs in the north of the city, girls in their mid-teens can be ordered along with beer and bar snacks. Most are from the poorer villages of central Java. The nightclubs give them accommodation in cramped boarding houses, and take most of the 120,000 rupiah ($9.20) they charge customers for an hour in a back room. The youngest girls are lucky, one bar worker says -- they can charge up to 140,000.
Indonesia's working children say they have no choice. "This is normal, I am earning money to support my mother," said an eight- year-old boy who scavenges for tin cans and old plastic bags at the Bekasi garbage dump. "Nobody is supporting me, so I cannot go to school."
He is among around 500 children and 3,000 adults who scavenge at the dump, wearing large baskets on their backs to collect the recyclable scraps buried in the mounds of rotting refuse. "I don't have any money so I cannot attend school," says a 13-year- old scavenger. He earns 40,000 rupiah a week.
School drop-out rate soars
The private Madrasah Nurul Falah school in an impoverished red-light district in central Jakarta provides free education to the area's poorest children. Headmaster Ahmad Shonhaji says more than a quarter of the school's pupils have dropped out over the last year.
"The monetary crisis has had an effect on the children. There are a number of them who have stopped attending school because their families cannot afford it," he said. The same pattern has been repeated across Indonesia, and in some rural areas the situation is even worse.
Education and Culture Minister Juwono Sudarsono told Reuters in an interview the number of eligible children enrolled in school has plunged to 54 percent in the current school year from 78 percent the previous year. "The school year started on July 20 and the final figures are not yet in. I have extended school registration until the second week of September, to give more time for parents who cannot afford the fees to maintain their children in school," he said.
Indonesia's government has launched a three-year rescue programme to try to halt the exodus of pupils from its schools. The Asian Development Bank is providing around $300 million over three years to help fund the scheme, while the World Bank will donate $90 million and bilateral donors $8 million to 10 million, Juwono said. Indonesia will contribute 1.2 trillion rupiah ($93 million).
The scheme will offer annual scholarships of 120,000 rupiah -- less than $10 -- to selected primary school pupils, 240,000 rupiah to junior secondary high school pupils and 380,000 rupiah to senior high school students. Schools are also being offered block grants to help with maintenance and buying books and equipment.
"We are trying to apply the scholarship schemes to the poorest of the poor -- the lowest 20 percent income group, for parents who cannot afford the fees. We will offer a reduction in the fees for those who are more well off," Juwono said.
Counting the cost
But cutting school fees and offering scholarships may prove little disincentive to families planning to pull their children out of school not because of the cost, but because of the amount their children can earn if they are put to work.
The annual scholarship of 120,000 rupiah offered to poorer primary school students counts for little when an eight-year old garbage dump scavenger can earn that amount in three weeks. "Over the past six months there were reports that parents have asked their younger boys and girls to leave school not because they cannot afford the fees but because the children are asked to make ends meet," Juwono said.
Economists say the long-term damage to Indonesia's human capital and international competitiveness could be severe. The humanitarian cost is equally severe -- years of progress in eliminating child labour have been reversed in a matter of months, and the country's success in raising literacy rates is also threatened.
"Since the decision to drop out is nearly always irreversible, even a temporary economic crisis can cause a cohort of children to have a lower lifetime education," the World Bank said in a briefing to Indonesia's donors in July. "The real tragedy of the Indonesian crisis is its effects on the poor and vulnerable. In many respects, this crisis has yet to unfold, and its dimensions are likely to be sobering."
[On August 20 Associated Press reported that US companies have air-lifted $1.73 million of medial supplies to Indonesia. The 30-ton shipment will arrive on September 11 and be taken to public hospitals in Jakarta and three other cities. Mark Schlansky, a Boeing Co. executive chair of UPLIFT International, a nonprofit organisation that specializes in medical airlifts said "Investing in people is what this is all about... Medical programs help people stay healthy, and this promotes a growing economy" - James Balowski.]
| Human rights/law |
[Waspada, the Medan daily, published today photographs of the exhumed skulls and bones and of the detention/torture centre ablaze, as well as a photograph of local people joyfully kicking and demolished a photo of Suharto that they had found hanging on the wall - Tapol.]
The National Committee of Human Rights Team Friday (21/8) discovered at least seven skeletons at the village Kualatari and Dayah Teumanah, Pidie Regency, about 170 km east of Banda Aceh. The skeletons were discovered after the team dug three places thought to be mass graves of victims of violence by the security apparatus in Aceh.
Speaking at the location of one of the digs of mass graves, the Secretary General of the Human Rights Team Baharuddin Lopa, who was accompanied by other members of his team -- Koesparmono Irsan, M Salim and Soegiri -- said that what had happened in Aceh was beyond human comprehension , and should be given proper attention. It was the duty of the government to investigate the case in conformity with the laws in force, he said.
The first place investigated was on the Kualatari Coast, about 330 km east of Banda Aceh which is along the Malacca Strait, far from centres of human settlement. When the human rights team arrived, villagers turned up in large numbers to provide information. They said that since 1990, in an area of about two hectares along the coast, a number of persons had been buried by the security forces at night. The local people said they did not know where the people who were buried had come from. "The bodies were transported in vehicles with darkened windows, and we didn't dare to ask about anything." said Ibrahim, a local inhabitant. He and several others knew the exact location of the graves but had never dared to speak about it. "There was a military operation going on, so who could we report to? We didn't want to create problems for ourselves."
After taking a close look, the team dug at a place about 200 meters from the sea. After digging down 60 cm, they came across a white package which proved to be a fertilizer sack wound round by plant roots. In it was a skull and human bones. There was a bullet hole in one of the skulls. Another skeleton was clad in Hing's underwear No. 31 which had not yet decomposed and a belt. They then found another sack which also contained a skull.
The team then halted their dig so that forensic experts could examine the findings. Lopa said that even before the experts had undertaken their investigations, it was possible to conclude that these were the victims of murder. After examination, the local people buried the remains in another location, praying as they did so.
Set ablaze by the people Later that day, a second dig was performed near a large house called Rumoh Geudong, surrounded by a spacious garden. This had formerly been a tradition house of the Acehnese nobility (ulee balang) of Glumpang Minyeuk. The house has been vacated for many years and in the past few years, had been used as a post by the security forces. It is located about 15 kms from the location of the first dig. Several witnesses told the team, that a number of corpses had been buried there but the dig only produced some bones which will be examined by forensic experts.
The members of the team entered the building and found several rooms 2x2 metres in size. There were chains hanging on the walls and a 70cm long piece of wood.which was partly splintered. This was probably the place where victims had been beaten.
The dig was witnessed by thousands of people from the Pidie Regency who arrived in buses and cars. They suspected that this was the location of a mass grave but the team which took earth samples only found parts of a hand. The upper part of the building had been turned into several cubicles. On the floor, the team found a pile of electricity cables.
This had been a building full of horrors for the local people who had frequently heard the screams of people being tortured there, but they had to pretend that they had heard nothing because they were so afraid. They spoke of their sense of horror during the time the building had been occupied by security personnel and their prisoners.
According to local inhabitants, since March 1998 the place was used as a detention centre for about 50 men and women, accused of being involved in the Wild Disturbers Movement (GPL). But when the Parliamentary Fact Finding Team visited the location at the beginning of August, there were only a few security guards there and no prisoners. An hour after the team left, the local people set fire to the house.
Lopa, Koesparmono Irsan, M Salim and Soegiri were also approached by dozens of women who reported that their husbands had disappeared, and who said they had been raped and tortured by the security forces. They wept as they told the team what they had experienced. They expressed the hope that the security personnel who perpetrated these crimes would be brought to justice.
"We want our husbands to be returned to us. If they are dead, we want to bury them," said Nurjannah, the mother of three children, who wept as she spoke. Her husband Jamaluddin, had been a government employee in Sigli, but he never returned home after being taken away by security personnel on 26 February 1998.
Nyak Maneh had suffered even more tragically. When she was unable to tell the security personnel of the whereabouts of her husband, M. Kaoy, this mother of three was taken to a security post, stripped naked and raped. "I dont know who the rapists were because they all wore masks," she said. Most of the women who came to testify said they knew the names of the people who had taken their husbands away and who had maltreated them. They mentioned the names and units of the persons.
Five skeletons found
In the afternoon the team went to Dayah Teumanah village, Trieng Gadeng district, about 170 km east of Trieng Gadang where they dug till the nightfall as they want to find more facts. Towards evening, they found another five skeletons. An eye witness named Hasan Ishak, told the investigators that they had been bound together and shot at the same time by security personnel in May 1991. The names of the victims were Muniruddin Kaoy (24), Armiya (26), Ibrahim, M Yusuf and Ismail Hasan (45) all of whom were teachers of religion.
Lopa said that these investigations had been heart-rending. It was often difficult to accept that such things had happened here in this country, women raped and tortured and men made to disappear. "May the Almighty give us the strength to go on looking for the fact," he said. The team plans to carry out digs at several places in north and and east Aceh on Saturday.
[According to a August 19 report in Serambi Indonesia, as troops from Kopassus are being withdrawn from parts of Aceh, human rights abuses are still continuing. The report quoted Nyak Maneh who was held as hostage for her husband, then raped and tortured by Kopassus officers wanting her to divulge his whereabouts. She had told the Jakarta daily, Republika earlier this month that she knows the names of her rapists and is prepared to expose him to the authorities - James Balowski.]
Louise Williams, Jakarta -- As the Indonesian military faces a damning human rights investigation, residents of the northern province of Aceh are guarding what are claimed to be mass graves, saying they fear there will be attempts to remove the evidence.
Indonesian troops began withdrawing from Aceh yesterday, following a public apology to the province's people by the armed forces chief, General Wiranto, for human rights abuses.
General Wiranto ordered the withdrawal after local human rights groups identified mass graves believed to hold the remains of thousands of victims of torture and summary executions during military operations between 1989 and 1992, and again from last year until June. "There are signs of the killing fields," a diplomatic source said. "There were people disappearing, people being killed, rapes, brutality and lack of discipline on the part of the military forces in the area."
A representative of the Legal Aid Institute in the provincial capital of Banda Aceh said six bodies had been dumped in the city recently with signs of torture, following the public statements about military abuses. "We believe there is a movement to scrap the evidence, and we suspect some people are trying to dig up the graves and remove the bones," he said. "Local people are taking turns to guard the site."
The Indonesian Commission on Human Rights was due to send a fact-finding team to the sites late yesterday, saying the human rights violations in Aceh, East Timor and Irian Jaya were systematic and typical of the regime of the former president, Mr Soeharto.
The first 250 troops were due to leave yesterday, and another 800 at the end of the month. The military authorities have not revealed how many troops will remain. "The Indonesian armed forces is fighting to save its image," the diplomatic source said. "An investigation into the Aceh killings will be difficult to quarantine because it implicates a lot of senior officers who are still in top positions."
While there have been some leadership changes in the armed forces since Mr Soeharto stepped down in May, many of the most senior generals remain in powerful positions either in the military or the Government of Dr B.J.Habibie. The military is also facing investigations into the kidnapping and torture of democracy activists and the shooting of student protesters under Mr Soeharto.
The military offensive in Aceh began in 1989 to put down a fundamentalist Muslim movement fighting for an Islamic state in the mainly Muslim province. Local grievances were fanned by economic injustice as the people of Aceh watched their valuable gas and oil resources being skimmed off by Jakarta and multinational companies with few benefits returning to the province.
At its height the Aceh Merdeka (Free Aceh) movement numbered up to 1,000 followers, but estimates now put the force at no more than 30 poorly organised guerillas confined to the jungles. The military operation against Aceh Merdeka targeted suspected sympathisers as well as guerillas, and according to Amnesty International 2,000 people were killed between 1989 and 1992, and another 1,600 disappeared.
During national elections last year the campaign of fear and brutality was stepped up again to ensure support for the ruling Golkar party, according to diplomatic sources. "There is a great deal of trauma and fear in Aceh," a source said. "Widows of men who were killed were even ostracised because people feared they would be taken as well if they associated with the surviving family members."
The Jakarta Post reported: "Estimates made by independent investigators on the basis of field observations and interviews indicate the number of people who were killed, went missing or were physically abused runs into thousands."
Don Greenlees -- Three ageing Indonesian communists, jailed after the abortive 1965 coup, were granted their freedom yesterday in a round of Independence Day amnesties designed to bolster President B.J. Habibie's claims to promoting human rights.
But the presidential decree releasing 28 political prisoners failed to include high-profile figures in the coup of September 30, 1965, including Abdul Latief, 72. East Timorese resistance leader Xanana Gusmao and People's Democratic Party leader Budiman Sudjatmiko also remain behind bars.
Despite a hardline policy on the 1965 coup plotters and members of the banned Indonesian Communist Party, Dr Habibie granted clemency to three ex-PKI members on the grounds of old age, declining health and good behaviour.
Manan Effendi, 80, Alexander Warouw, 80, and Pujo Prasetyo, 70, have been incarcerated for more than 30 years for "subversion". Their release will heighten pressure on the Government to show the same leniency to four more prominent 1965 prisoners who are also in frail health.
Colonel Latief, the most senior remaining inmate from the coup, recently suffered a stroke in jail. Three fellow 1965 prisoners have spent 30 years on death row. Six other convicted coup plotters were executed as late as 1989. The latest decree brings to almost 120 the number of political prisoners to be released since Dr Habibie replaced former president Suharto on May 21.
Despite the rush of political freedoms in the past three months, yesterday's 53rd anniversary of independence from Dutch colonial rule was a muted celebration. Outside the formal ceremonies centred on the independence monument and the presidential palace, few Indonesians, reeling from the country's worst economic crisis were in a mood to celebrate.
Predictions of more rioting -- which saw many Chinese fleeing major cities over the long weekend -- failed to eventuate. Nonetheless, thousands of troops were deployed in city streets to secure the peace. Among the prisoners named in yesterday's announcement were individuals jailed for their part in insurgencies in East Timor and Aceh.
Reuters reports from Beijing that groups of university students held unauthorised demonstrations outside Indonesia's embassy yesterday to mark Independence Day, but police kept the encounters cordial. Ethnic Chinese also held a day-long protest outside the Indonesian embassy in Manila.
[Despite widespread rumours, no People's Democratic Party (PRD) leaders were released on August 17 although PRD chair Budiman Sujatmiko and others had their sentences reduced by one month. Xanana Gusmao was also not released. PRD lawyers announced the news to a picket outside the prison organised by the Committee for the Preparation for the Legalisation of the PRD and the East Timorese Students Union. Budiman and Gusmao were able to address the rally of about 250 people - James Balowski.]
| News & issues |
Jakarta -- Gangs of grave robbers have been digging up Chinese graveyards in two cities on the Indonesian island of Java and looting them of coffins of valuables and discarding the remains, officials and a press report said Friday.
The Jakarta Post reported that weeping relatives and graveyard guardians were powerless to stop the gangs, armed with knives and sickles, in the cities of Pekalongan and Surakarta. "It is true, but we can't say how many," Sergeant Fitri, an adjutant to Pekalongan police chief Colonel Ismu Haryono told AFP by phone. Fitri said no arrests had been made.
The Post quoted cemetery officials as saying that they had counted 268 graves dug up in the two cities by the looters, who arrived in groups of 10 armed with saws, crowbars and digging tools at all times of day and night. They broke open the coffins, took whatever jewellery and valuables they found buried -- according to Chinese tradition -- with the dead, and often also made off with the coffins that are usually made of thick valuable wood, the Post said.
The robbers usually come and leave with their loots on the backs of trucks and left the remains scattered on the ground, the daily said. "In one incident the thieves failed to open the teak casket, so they just threw it on their truck," Surakarta cemetery guard Sastro told the Post. Relatives visiting the looted graves of their ancestors over the past month broke down in shock, seeing the remains scattered and the tombs desecrated, it said. Over the past month Chinese throughout Asia have been protesting at Indonesian embassies over the brutal treatment meted out to the country's ethnic-Chinese minority during the May riots that preceded the fall of former president Suharto.
Jakarta -- The Supreme Court has dismissed a case filed by opposition leader Megawati Sukarnoputri against the government over her 1996 ouster as head of the Indonesian Democracy Party (PDI), court officials said Wednesday.
Judge I Gede Ketut Sukarata of the Central Jakarta district court on Wednesday read out a summary of the Supreme Court decision which ruled the court had no authority to judge the case. "This is a final decision," Sukarata said.
The ruling dated Tuesday upheld a lower court decision which had thrown out the case against three government officials and three PDI officials whom Megawati accused of illegally ousting her from the party's leadership in June 1996. The lawsuit filed in August 1996 named then home affairs minister Yogi Suardi Memed, former armed forces chief general Feisal Tanjung and the then national police chief, Lieutenant General Dibyo Widodo.
Suryadi, who was appointed to replace Megawati at the helm of the party was also named in the case as well as Fatimah Achmad and Buttu Hutapea, two of the main leaders of the rival PDI faction which had ousted her.
The Central Jakarta district court had initially dismissed the case saying it had no authority to judge "the internal affairs" of a party. The Megawati camp then appealed that decision which was overturned by a higher court. But the six defendants including Suryadi took the case to the Supreme Court which on Tuesday ruled on their behalf.
Jakarta -- A recent survey on which party people will vote for shows that a majority of people have yet to make up their minds. However, those who have decided tend to support the Indonesian Democratic Party (PDI) led by Megawati Soekarnoputri.
The survey, conducted by the Political Science Lab of the University of Indonesia in association with Soegeng Sarjadi Syndicated, found that nearly 60 percent of the 4,925 respondents either did not know or refused to answer when queried about their choice of party if an election was to be held now.
But 40 percent who did reply said they would vote for the Megawati-led PDI. Golkar came in a distant second with 12.9 percent, while a future party formed by critic Amien Rais came third with 10.8 percent. The United Development Party remains a feature with 8.5 percent while the newly formed People's Awakening Party (PKB) established by leading Nadlatul Ulama figures received 1.5 percent.
Of interest is that, according to the survey, the much maligned Soerjadi camp of the PDI actually received a higher percentage, 0.8 percent, of support from respondents than the Indonesian Democratic Union Party (PUDI) led by the high profile Sri Bintang Pamungkas. The poll, results of which were made public here Saturday, randomly took respondents from Jakarta, Yogyakarta, Surabaya, Banda Aceh, Medan, Kupang, Pontianak, Ujungpandang and Denpasar. However, 52 percent of the respondents live in Jakarta.
A 10th city, Manado, was also surveyed but the results could not be processed due to transportation problems. The respondents came from a mixture of occupations and backgrounds with three- fourths aged between 17 and 45.
Respondents were asked three topical questions -- the party system, political inclinations and the future of Golkar. On the first topic respondents were asked: how many parties should contest the election, is the assembling of crowds still necessary and whether they agreed that religion based parties were no longer necessary.
On the first question 58.1 percent chose the highest selection, four to 10 parties, while 31.2 percent said three parties. An overwhelming majority, 58.4 percent, also said that assembling crowds were necessary to show support for parties. The poll also showed that 70.1 percent felt that religion based parties were no longer appropriate.
On the second topic, 52.7 percent said their choice of party would be based on its programs. The importance of the party leader or ideology received 17.4 and 10.6 percent respectively. Another question on this topic was which party they would select if elections were held today. The third topic on Golkar simply asked whether Golkar was capable of winning the next election. The response was a resounding "No" from 33.1 percent of respondents. Some 2 percent said it was "very possible" while another 18.9 percent still believe Golkar "might" win.
In a written summation of its findings, the survey warns of potentially large pockets of nonvoters. It points out that 51.9 percent of respondents claim they do not intend to vote in coming elections. Other cities with a large number of potential nonvoters are Surabaya (27.1 percent) and Denpasar (8.4 percent).
Noted Indonesianist Harold Crouch of the National University in Australia, commenting on the results of the poll said it mainly reflected the opinion of the middle class in urban areas.
He pointed out that the People's Awakening Party would likely get a higher response outside urban areas since its base support, Nahdlatul Ulama members, reside in rural areas. "I think it would come out different if the poll was in Java's rural areas," he remarked.
Political scientist Maswadi Rauf of the University of Indonesia, said one interesting result for him was the disapproval, 70.1 percent, of religion based parties. "It is interesting to see that 52 percent of respondents would choose their political parties, not based on traditional or polarizing reasons as was the case in the past, but because of its programs," he remarked.
Soegeng, a former Golkar legislator who switched allegiance to the Soerjadi-led PDI who sponsored the poll, said it was carried out to examine public reaction to the appearance of new political parties. He pledged to conduct another poll with a wider range of respondents to observe the political climate before the planned special session of People's Consultative Assembly in November.
Last month, the first poll he sponsored was carried out to survey people's opinion of Habibie's three-month government. It showed that Habibie's policies failed to win over the hearts of the people.
Jeremy Wagstaff, Jakarta -- In his first Independence Day speech as president, B.J. Habibie used words and gestures to formally break with the authoritarian regime of his predecessor and paint his vision of a new democratic era. But while his marathon address won modest applause, Mr. Habibie is a long way from winning over the skeptics.
At the heart of concerns is the belief that, after nearly 100 days in the job, the president isn't up to rescuing a moribund economy and the confidence of the country's ethnic Chinese. "Some people said it was a very good speech, and it reflects Habibie's skills, but can he implement it? I don't think he has enough power," said Arbi Sanit, a political science lecturer at University of Indonesia.
Underlining the lack of confidence, members of the ethnic- Chinese minority have fled in droves from Jakarta and other major cities after rumors of impending unrest this weekend. In May, gangs of youths swept through neighborhoods of ethnic Chinese, looting, burning and reportedly raping as they went. Some blamed ethnic-Chinese business owners for the country's economic ills.
In the northern Jakarta suburb of Pluit, mainly ethnic-Chinese neighborhoods were quiet and tense on Sunday, newly erected fences and gates guarded by security guards at the entrance to most side streets. "Residents are worried they will become a target. There's a lack of confidence in the government," said Tjia Tek Ijoe, a factory owner and the local neighborhood coordinator. He said he didn't expect riots Monday, Indonesia's National Day holiday, but was taking no chances. "We are ready," he said.
In his Saturday speech, Mr. Habibie tried to assuage such concerns, as well as doubts about his own democratic credentials. Not once mentioning his predecessor and former protector Suharto by name, he outlined the period since Indonesia's declared independence in 1945, describing how outdated security concerns of the Suharto presidency led to its collapse and the beginning of what he called the "Democratic Resurgence Era."
Road to 'civil society'
Apologizing for human rights violations of the past, Mr. Habibie outlined his blueprint for a "civil society" and a more suitable role for the traditionally powerful military. He said the country's laws must be overhauled to create order and a just society. He also hinted that the police, tarnished for their role in the shooting of four university students in May, could be separated from the armed forces. "It's clear he was trying to put some space between himself and Suharto, and give the lie to the belief that he is more of the same," said one Western diplomat of Mr. Habibie's speech.
Mr. Habibie's delivery also reflected the sharp contrast in styles between the two presidents. Much of it appeared deliberate. While Mr. Suharto rarely spoke for more than an hour, Mr. Habibie spoke for just under two. While Mr. Suharto always spoke quietly and solemnly, Mr. Habibie spoke dramatically. He drew laughter from the audience when he asked their permission to take a drink; Mr. Suharto rarely drank before finishing his speech and never cracked jokes. As he left the House of Representatives afterward, the president glad-handed members, a stark departure from Mr. Suharto's stiff formality.
Shadows of the past
To be sure, question marks hang over the substance of Mr. Habibie's commitment to a future free of corruption and nepotism. On Friday, he included his wife and brother Junus among nearly 40 recipients of national medals issued to coincide with National Day. Umar Juoro, executive secretary of the Institute for National Development Studies, said that while legal, the awards looked like "nepotism as usual."
Others fear Mr. Habibie isn't politically strong enough to carry through his political promises. Analysts said that he remains dependent on the support of a military itself weakened by public resentment at its failure to prevent rioting in May. Furthermore, while trying to win over those calling for a rapid shift from the authoritarian politics of the past to democracy, he also appears keen not to alienate his Muslim supporters who would like to see a greater role for Islam in the country. "It's a balancing act, and it's not clear he's really keeping things steady," said one Indonesian intellectual.
Economically, Mr. Habibie's speech spelled out little that was new. He stressed reforming financial institutions, resolving private-sector debt, eliminating monopolies and freeing business from corruption. But beyond warning of the continued need for high interest rates until "inflation can be reduced, and money reverting to banks," there was little to convince economists Mr. Habibie was setting priorities.
He stands accused of making populist gestures at a time when key sectors of the economy need a firm hand. Analysts looking at his speech said it isn't clear how the president is going to continue subsidizing prices of basic commodities while also pumping money into the banking system -- some 146 trillion rupiah (US$11 billion) at the last count.
"Concerns are mainly about the economy. Besides the IMF money what can he claim to have done? Life is getting very, very difficult for ordinary Indonesians," said Mr. Juoro. The International Monetary Fund in July agreed to provide an extra $6 billion in funding in addition to a $43 billion IMF-led bailout package assembled late last year.
[On August 15, Antara reported that Habibie has told the Supreme Advisory Council that he will complete his five-year presidential term - James Balowski.]
| Arms/armed forces |
Anthony Spaeth -- When Indonesian students occupied the country's parliament in May, their principal demand was the resignation of Suharto, president of the country for 32 years. Within days, he had stepped down. But Suharto was more than a replaceable president: he was the keystone in the entire governing structure of modern Indonesia -- and without knowing or requesting it, those students touched off a virtual revolution.
The most astonishing change has come in the fortunes of the Indonesian armed forces, known by the vernacular acronym ABRI. For five decades, ABRI has been an all-powerful and virtually omnipresent institution in the barracks and in jungle battles, in parliament and on the business scene. Only weeks ago, few Indonesians would have had the courage to criticize the armed forces or question their role in society. Those days are well in the past. Last week two senior police officers were convicted of ordering the shootings of student demonstrators in May -- four died -- and 16 more security personnel will be tried for their roles in that slaughter. (In Indonesia, police are under the command of the military.) The military Honor Council, a seven- member disciplinary body, recommended that Lieutenant-General Prabowo Subianto, a Suharto son-in-law, be court-martialed for ordering the abduction and torture of political activists. Fourteen are still missing. And the military started pulling its troops out of Aceh following an apology by current armed forces commander General Wiranto for nearly a decade of brutality in that province. The move was so unprecedented that many detected the sound of a police state being dismantled. "In the eyes of the people, ABRI's reputation has been destroyed," says historian Hermawan Sulistiyo of the Indonesian Institute of Sciences.
It's hard to tell if Suharto's fall, and a sudden flowering of openness and political agitation, made the military's tumble inevitable, or whether its most recent misdeeds started the process. Public anger has been inflamed by ever-mounting evidence of the military's involvement in the chaos that preceded Suharto's ouster. The riots that rocked Jakarta in mid-May, in which some 1,000 people were killed and an estimated 168 women raped, are increasingly seen as having been sparked or engineered by a segment of the military. The apparent aim was to create enough chaos to force Suharto to step down and bequeath his office to another military man. Wiranto, who ultimately consolidated his control of the armed forces over rival Prabowo, went before television cameras two weeks ago and told the nation: "ABRI does not hesitate to ask for forgiveness for the fact that the incident [the May riots] could not be prevented."
Absolution isn't anticipated: if anything, the public is clamoring for investigations into decades of military abuse, from the execution without trial of thousands of suspected criminals in 1983 to a massacre of protesters in Lampung in 1989. "I think people will take it back to the 1970s, or even the 1960s," says Endy Bayuni, managing editor of the daily Jakarta Post.
The pace of revelation is already amazing. A military tribunal sentenced two members of the Police Mobile Brigade to four and ten months in prison respectively for firing into a crowd of protesters on May 12 at Trisakti University. That incident fuelled the antigovernment sentiment that ultimately brought students to occupy the parliament building. Whoever did the shooting has yet to be identified, though 16 anti-riot personnel are awaiting trial. More intriguing is the work of the military Honor Council, which is investigating the disappearance of student activists over the 12-month period before Suharto's ouster.
Human rights groups say 24 political activists were abducted, of whom only 10 have reappeared. The council has questioned top uniformed men and inspected locations where the abductees were believed to have been imprisoned. Sources tell Time that special forces officers are admitting to the abduction of four members of the Indonesian People's Party, a left-wing group that was banned under Suharto. Last week the council announced that Prabowo was "responsible" for the kidnappings -- and that he had "misinterpreted his orders." The orders could have come from one of four people: Gen. Feisal Tanjung, armed forces commander for most of the 12-month period; Wiranto, then-army chief of staff; Wiranto's predecessor Gen. Hartono; and Prabowo's father-in-law, Suharto. Late last week, the head of the council proclaimed that the order had not come from either Suharto or Tanjung, but no one knew what that meant.
Such ambiguity, and a cascade of discredit could easily threaten the military's long-accepted "dual function" -- to both defend the country and to share in its running. "When we started the Revolution in 1945," recalls retired General Kemal Idris, "we considered ourselves as part of the people. We were the people. But Suharto turned Indonesia into a military regime. He could order the military to do anything, and he abused that power."
Already, that dual function is being whittled away in the post-Suharto era. Under legislative amendments drafted by the Ministry of Home Affairs, the armed forces' unelected presence in the House of Representatives will be reduced from 75 seats -- or 15% of the total -- to 55 seats. Wiranto and his inner circle say they accept the need for such change. According to Hasnan Habib, a retired general and former ambassador to the United States, a total withdrawal -- not just a tactical retreat -- is now required: "ABRI has failed," he says. "It no longer has the right to demand a continuing role in politics."
But even if the military's political role is drastically changed on paper, its reach across the archipelago is wide and deep. Military units work closely with civilian authorities at the provincial, district, sub-district and village levels exerting powerful control. ABRI also patronizes a number of paramilitary organizations, and some commanders are believed to have fostered links with the shady Pemuda Pancasila, a group suspected of playing a role in the rapes, looting and arson in Jakarta in May. "These are the real instruments of the military's political control," says political scientist Cornelius Lay of Yogyakarta's Gadjah Mada University.
The change of leadership began that process almost overnight. "ABRI's identity was inseparable from that of Suharto," says political observer Marsilam Simanjuntak. "Now that Suharto has fallen, ABRI has fallen with him. People are no longer afraid of the apparatus." In Aceh, there's little gratitude toward the military for pulling out -- and mounting calls for retribution and arrests of soldiers and officers. Starting in the early 1990s, the armed forces cracked down hard on a separatist movement in Aceh. The National Human Rights Commission is investigating reports that more than 39,000 Acehnese died in military operations and 1,000 remain in detention.
If that wasn't challenge enough, the military also finds itself in a financial crisis. Suharto facilitated ABRI's expansion into a range of businesses -- everything from retail to aviation -- and profits supplemented the armed forces' budget. (They also enriched many an officer.) Like nearly all businesses in Indonesia, the military's are on the edge of bankruptcy. Even if the generals reduce their role voluntarily, it will be hard for a diverse and widely scattered country, which has virtually no democratic experience, to replace the institution that kept it intact. "We have to build a new Indonesia," says the Rev. Mangun Wijaya, a Catholic priest and author. That prospect, and process, has Indonesia's marching men uneasy in their very large boots.
[On August 18 the Jakarta Post reported that according to Kopassus' commandant Major General Syahrir M.S., troops remain high-spirited and unaffected by the ongoing investigation of the forces' involvement in the abduction and torture of political activists. "The Kopassus troops' morale remains high... their loyalty to the country and the nation remains the best", he said - James Balowski.]
Christopher Torchia, Jakarta -- Clustered outside an Indonesian courthouse, students clapped when they heard a judge convict two policemen in the killings of campus protesters. Seconds later, they groaned in disappointment when the sentences were announced.
The Indonesian military judge sentenced the officers to four years and 10 months in prison for failing to control troops accused of gunning down four students at a pro-democracy rally in May. The crowd called the punishment too soft.
In a flurry of internal trials and probes, Indonesia's military -- the most stable institution in a fragile land -- has embarked on a campaign to atone for abuses under its authoritarian boss, former President Suharto. Critics, however, say the investigations are cosmetic, focusing largely on lower- ranking scapegoats in a bid to appease demands for reform.
The military is counseling patience, saying those who allegedly shot the student protesters earlier this year are under arrest and will be punished harshly if convicted.
The 490,000-member military, which includes the police, is harried by more than just a lousy image as Indonesia buckles under economic hardship. Budget cuts are diminishing the ability of the armed forces to keep order in this archipelago nation of 200 million people. Yet the military is still widely viewed as the only force that can preserve unity in a country ravaged by inflation and joblessness.
In Indonesia's new era of reform, the military is under scrutiny as never before. Anxious to shed a legacy of suppressing dissent, armed forces chief Gen. Wiranto has launched two high- profile investigations:
But government opponents fear other commanders possibly linked to the kidnappings will not be targeted. And 14 activists remain missing and are feared dead.With two already convicted, another 16 police officers face trial in the shooting deaths of the student protesters at Jakarta's Trisakti University. Ten members of Indonesia's special forces have been arrested for alleged involvement in the kidnapping and torture of more than two dozen activists. Also under investigation is Lt. Gen. Prabowo Subianto, son-in-law of Suharto and former head of the elite unit.
"Prabowo, of course, did not do it by himself. There was some networking by the army," said Amien Rais, a prominent opposition figure who believes civilian prosecutors should investigate the military's entire command structure. "This is only a political joke," he said. The panel of military officers investigating the abductions, known as the "honor council," has barred the public from hearings.
A host of other accusations taint the military, including alleged arbitrary killings and torture in several provinces that harbor small bands of separatist rebels. In Aceh province, Wiranto publicly apologized for military abuses and said he would pull out some troops, as he has done in the former Portuguese colony of East Timor. The armed forces also faces calls to reduce its dominant role in politics and give up authority over the police.
There has been little resistance within the military to housecleaning by Wiranto, who over the last few months has demoted or replaced rivals, including Prabowo. But some rank-and-file soldiers are bewildered that punishment is suddenly being meted out for actions condoned under Suharto.
At a recent meeting, a group of retired military officers told Wiranto, once a personal adjutant to Suharto, that he was too slow with reforms. "You must have patience. I cannot accomplish this overnight," Wiranto was quoted as saying repeatedly by Hasnan Habib, an ex-army general and former ambassador to the US.
Wiranto is respected as honest, but even he may end up a target. Human rights activists say he should explain why security forces reacted slowly to the May riots. A government panel, including military officials, is investigating whether elements in the armed forces incited the riots.
Lhokseumawe -- Indonesian troops began a pullout from troubled Aceh province yesterday to cheers and catcalls from locals who say a nine-year army crackdown involved torture, rape and the dumping of victims in mass graves.
After a brief ceremony in the industrial city of Lhokseumawe on the northern tip of Sumatra, 50 soldiers from the elite Kopassus special forces and 200 regular troops picked up their rucksacks and marched on to a waiting convoy of 12 trucks. A crowd of about 500 local residents cheered, shouted abuse and shook their fists.
The army said it would withdraw a further 729 troops, including 29 Kopassus soldiers, on Aug 31. Its promised withdrawal of all combat troops from the province would then be complete. The military leaves behind accusations of mass killings and widespread human rights violations during a campaign against a separatist insurgency in the staunchly Muslim province since 1989.
The military has not revealed the strength of its forces in Aceh. A spokesman in Lhokseumawe insisted the 979 troops being withdrawn represented the entire combat force in Aceh, but some newspapers have estimated there are 6,000 combat troops in addition to an equal number of other soldiers.
Acehnese human rights groups say there are at least nine mass graves in the province, containing up to 1,600 corpses. Indonesia's official Human Rights Commission said a team of its members would begin investigating the grave sites this week.
Locals watching the departure ceremony from the perimeter of the parade ground were quiet at first but became increasingly raucous, interrupting the ceremony with cheering. As the soldiers left, the crowds were jubilant. "They have done nothing but make the people of Aceh suffer. We're glad they're gone," said Mr Rizal, one of a crowd of young men shouting abuse at the convoy of passing trucks.
[This item also included a second story titled "Jakarta's time of terror: a Chinese girl's tragic story" which was omitted because an almost identical item appeared in a previous issue of NetNews.]
Louise Williams -- Blindfolded and beaten, the kidnapped political activist focused on each tiny detail. How long had they been driving before reaching the interrogation centre? How many bumps were there on the road before the gate? How many stairs led up to the cells? Could he hear planes or trains? Could he smell grass? Were there schoolchildren playing nearby? Did the drains run downhill?
Once inside, his blindfold removed, he had to count the tiles, remember their color, feel their texture, count the paces to the room where the doctor examined him before the torture began, and -- most importantly -- listen for the sounds of any of his friends. Focusing like this was vital if he was to survive the torture -- electric shocks, beatings, mock executions, humiliation and fear.
From late last year until March this year, scores of opponents of Indonesia's Soeharto regime disappeared from their homes and off the streets. They were abducted by masked men and taken to unknown places, their tormentors confident the prisoners did not know where they were nor the identity of their captors. But for seven years a group of human rights activists headed by a young lawyer called Munir had been compiling files on the disappearances, quietly accumulating descriptions of detention centres, safe houses and private villas used by members of the armed forces in illegal operations against critics of the Government.
In March this year the pieces of the jigsaw began to fit. A young activist called Waluyo Jati was dumped, dazed and terrified, after his ordeal. He did not know where he had been, but he was able to sketch the cell. The drawing matched a detention cell inside the headquarters of the military's most prestigious unit, the Special Forces, then under the control of Soeharto's son-in-law Lieutenant-General Prabowo Subianto.
"The tiles on the floor were red and white, the national colors, so we knew for sure," Munir says. "But if I had revealed that information then, I would have been killed, so we waited."
Two months later, with Soeharto barely clinging to power, Munir publicly linked the Special Forces, known as Kopassus, to the disappearances. Within weeks Soeharto was forced out, after devastating riots in Jakarta in which 1200 died, scores were gang-raped and thousands of buildings were burnt and looted.
Last week a military honor board called Prabowo for questioning over the disappearances. The former rising star in the nation's most powerful institution admitted his role in the kidnapping, saying he was acting on orders to monitor anti- Government activities.
The fall of Soeharto and the public clamor for justice for the serious human rights abuses during his 32 years in power have exposed the armed forces (known as ABRI) as a "flawed and compromised" institution, which must now account publicly for the excesses of the past and which may never regain its leading position within society.
At the same time, Indonesia's economic crisis is hurting morale in the lower ranks, with official salaries now well below the poverty line, and opportunities to supplement incomes through business dealings and corruption, drying up. The implications are immense.
Some analysts say the remaking of the armed forces is merely the inevitable process of redefining the power relationship after three decades in which Soeharto used the military as a political tool to perpetuate his rule.
Others have warned that the soul-searching will open a Pandora's box, which may trigger a crisis of confidence and threaten the unity of the security forces just as Indonesia faces a new round of turbulence in the lead-up to next year's general elections. Beyond the kidnapping investigation are the court- martialling of 18 soldiers involved in the killing of four student protesters in May, and calls for investigations into past massacres of civilians by troops, such as the 1991 Dili killings and the shooting of protesters in Tanjung Priok in 1984.
In the past few weeks the armed forces commander, General Wiranto, has ordered a reduction of troop numbers in East Timor and has ordered troops in Irian Jaya to put down their guns and pick up hoes and seeds to help the people plant crops. In the northern province of Aceh, he apologised to the local people and ordered soldiers out, after human rights groups located mass graves of victims of military operations of the 1980s and 1990s. And the military stands accused of, at the very least, failing to protect the people during riots last May.
However, there is a blacker theory that argues that the torching of Jakarta was the result of a power struggle between Wiranto and Prabowo. Some argue that the riots raged out of control because Prabowo's men first stoked them, then walked away, hoping the ensuing chaos would discredit Wiranto and pave the way for Prabowo's promotion to the top job.
"What has happened is that the myth of the military as being at one with the people has been shattered," says one observer, referring to ABRI's history as a people's army that liberated Indonesia from Dutch colonial rule.
A retired general, Hasnan Habib, a former ambassador to the United States, says: "The military really has a very severe image problem, both domestically and internationally, which we acquired during the Soeharto years."
He believes the "severe" human rights violations by the armed forces began in 1982 during the "mysterious killings" in which thousands of suspected criminals were rounded up and executed. "We denied it, of course. This was outside the judicial process -- we were just killing people. It was never the official policy of the armed forces, but Soeharto himself later admitted it in his autobiography.
"General Wiranto recognises that the military now has to get to the bottom of all this, no matter how painful it is for them. They are also aware that the way they were integrated into politics will never be the same again."
Insiders say the ABRI leadership met in late February this year, when at least one senior officer insisted the kidnappings must stop. The meeting, however, confirmed that the entire leadership knew about the disappearances, despite public denials of any military involvement.
The question remaining in the case of Prabowo is who gave the order to "monitor" the activists. It is possible the original order came from Soeharto himself, who was the supreme commander of the armed forces. Those close to Prabowo say he believes he was merely carrying out orders, "using whatever possible means". Under Indonesian military law, if a soldier commits a crime in carrying out a legal order issued by a superior, he cannot be charged under criminal law.
"Under these circumstances it is not such a big step to go from an order to monitor to interrogation," an observer says. "There is no denying this kind of behavior within the armed forces has been going on for a long time and now we are going to start to hear about it in great detail -- in Aceh, in Irian Jaya; and what will come out of East Timor will be extraordinary. We are dealing with a compromised and flawed organisation."
But how far can the witch-hunt go, without threatening the armed forces themselves, at a time when poverty and political uncertainty threaten internal stability? Munir believes the kidnappings investigation will try to localise the guilt, and lay the blame on Prabowo, despite the documented involvement of troops from seven units.
Now, as the coordinator for the Commission for Missing Persons and Victims of Violence, Munir's office is swamped with the relatives of those who have disappeared over the past three decades, many of whom were too terrified even to report their loss under the Soeharto regime. "For 32 years this has been going on. Some of the people are dead, some were too frightened to speak," he says.
The goal of the most recent round of kidnappings, Munir says, was to extract information about underground anti-Government networks and to turn people into informers in the lead-up to the March presidential elections. The level of sophistication was much greater than in the past, as the torture was carried out under medical supervision and great care was taken to conceal the captors' identity and location.
Military observers say Wiranto is using human rights to shore up his power base and rid the military of figures he does not like, such as Prabowo. Some sources say that the country's 7000 Special Forces troops, who developed a fierce loyalty to Prabowo and carved out a dominant position, are being confined to barracks to prevent them expressing their anger over the kidnapping investigation.
However, Wiranto is also regarded as a professional soldier willing to stay within the rules, despite having been close to Soeharto. "General Wiranto is using human rights to consolidate his position, but it will be hard to put a lid on all these investigations," says an Indonesia expert, Professor Richard Robison. "I can't help feeling the military will unravel internally." Robison thinks that unhappiness within the lower ranks, as well as the loss of money-making opportunities in outlying provinces such as East Timor, may turn some local units into guns for hire.
A diplomat adds: "The belief that the military is the only institution that can hold Indonesia together has taken a pounding. What is this whole thing doing for morale (when) you are picking on the best of the best (Kopassus) and may send their head to jail? "I think they can push the kidnapping investigations, because these are clear-cut cases, but if you forced an investigation into the May riots and it turned out that team A versus team B burnt down Jakarta, then the military could never face the people again."
Munir says he is not really concerned about whether Prabowo is punished. "Our bigger aim is to stop the state being used against the people. Right now I feel much safer. The international pressure on human rights issues is great. The people know the economic crisis cannot be solved by the armed forces. What is most important is the people now have the courage to speak up, because the main problem of a culture of fear is not just solving these cases, but overturning society's fear."
[On August 21 AFP reported that military will announce on August 24 whether three senior officers, including Prabowo, will face a court martial. Army Chief General Subagyo said the council will only "recommend": and that it would be up to Wiranto to decide on what action to take - James Balowski.]
| Economy and investment |
Jakarta -- Two weeks after its launch, an Indonesian agency tasked with helping the private sector to restructure its massive external debt has found no takers, an official said Wednesday.
"It appears like no one has registered yet. But this does not mean that they are not enthusiastic because this matter is still being processed (by them)," Bank Indonesia director Dono Iskandar said. Iskandar said a likely reason was that enterpreneurs might be waiting for the rupiah to strengthen before coming on board the Indonesian Debt Restructuring Agency, or INDRA.
INDRA was launched early this month offering a scheme under which corporate debtors will be allowed to reschedule loans for eight years on principal repayments of three years. It pegged the rupiah's exchange rate against the dollar at 13,233.
The figure represents the maximum exchange rate corporate debtors enrolling in the scheme will be required to pay until August 1, 2000 when the figure will be reset. The rupiah was trading at around 12,300 to the dollar at mid-day Wednesday.
Iskandar said, however, that the INDRA exchange rate would be adjusted should the rupiah strengten so that the private sector would not lose out from the scheme.
At the time of the launch earlier this month, he said at least 60 percent of corporate debtors would come on board the scheme drafted by the agency. The registration for corporates to take part in the program only began on August 3 and would end on June 30 next year. Indonesia's private sector external debt stood at 67.7 billion dollars, officials said in May.