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Al-Ahram Weekly 20 - 26 July 2000 Issue No. 491 
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Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 |
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Al-Ahram Weekly 20 - 26 July 2000 Issue No. 491
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| Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 |
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Egypt Region International Economy Opinion Culture Features Travel Living Sports Profile People Time Out Chronicles Cartoons Letters Indonesia Balkanised
By Faiza Rady
By all accounts, it appears Indonesia is once again at a crossroads. The fourth most-populous country in the world, Indonesia houses roughly 300 ethnic groups speaking some 250 different languages -- but this nation of 210 million people seems to be tearing at the seams. Following last year's liberation of East Timor, separatist movements in Aceh and Irian Jaya were given a new lease on life and calls for national independence have since reverberated across the vast archipelago.
In Irian Jaya, the eastern-most province of Indonesia, Jakarta was quick to denounce demands for self-determination. This week, Indonesian Foreign Minister Alwi Shihab warned political activists in Irian Jaya that they will face severe repression should they persist in their nationalist struggle. "Any effort to subvert our [Indonesia's] sovereignty over Irian Jaya and to instigate separatism in that province will face a stern reaction from the government," declared Shihab.
While liberation movements confront Jakarta, Indonesian President Abdurrahman Wahid faces yet another explosive situation in the Maluku Islands, where armed conflicts between Muslims and Christians are on the rise. In the last 18 months of clashes, more than 4,000 people have died and an estimated half million have become homeless.
As Wahid grapples with the sectarian violence, vowing to seek political solutions to end the conflict, his position on separatist aspirations is less clear-cut. The Indonesian president dropped a bombshell on a press conference in Jakarta last November when he recognised Aceh's right to self-determination. He quickly backtracked, however, after he was reprimanded by the powerful Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN), who feared a potential "Balkanisation" of the archipelago. Managing a swift, if somewhat incoherent turnabout, Wahid suddenly declared that "the Acehnese have no wish for independence." This, although Aceh's militant liberation struggle bears evident testimony to its nationalist aspirations.
A province of four million people with a long history of resistance to Dutch colonialism, Aceh fought against Suharto's iron rule for much of his 32-year-long regime. As a result, martial law was imposed there from 1989 to 1998, and Aceh was declared an "Area of Military Operations" (Daerah Operasi Militer, DOM). The Indonesian National Army (TNI) was in turn given a free hand against the secessionist liberation army of the Free Aceh Movement (Gerakan Aceh Merdeka, GAM). Amnesty International has documented the way TNI operations routinely included unfair political trials, systematic extra-judicial executions, "disappearances," torture, rape and the imprisonment of peaceful activists. Some 2,000 civilians were killed between 1989 and 1993 during counter-insurgency operations.
The government's historical repression of Aceh's struggle for self-determination should be viewed in the context of the province's wealth. Aceh is considered crucial to the development and growth of Indonesia's economy because of its rich natural resources, including oil, natural gas and timber. According to The Far Eastern Economic Review, gas exports from Aceh alone accounted for $1.3 billion last year. But while the central government and multi-nationals milk the province dry, little gains are accrued by the Acehnese people.
In Irian Jaya -- or West Papua (the government officially allowed the province to restore its historical name in January) -- the situation is much the same. A Dutch colony until 1963 (Indonesia proclaimed its independence in 1945), the West Papuan struggle for independence started in the early 1970s. Following the results of a highly-contested and dubious "popular" referendum, Indonesia annexed the province in 1969.
Rich in oil, copper and wood, West Papua constituted a prize catch for Suharto, who promptly undertook a mission of "creating facts" -- namely, changing the ethnic composition of the province. In fact, the Suharto regime tried to reinforce its annexation of the province by masterminding a massive campaign of transmigration to Papua. Hundreds of thousands of Indonesians from Java were shipped to the region with the aim of creating a demographic Javanese "majority," thus marginalising the native people.
As a result of the state-imposed transmigration policy, Javanese currently outnumber the Papuans. Among the two million inhabitants of the province, less than half are native people. Competing with the Javanese for a dwindling number of public service and industrial jobs, Papuans face ethnic discrimination on a shrinking labour market. A source of explosive tensions between the two nationalities, discriminative employment conditions are further exacerbated by the Papuans' seperatist agenda. The tense political situation often degenerates into armed confrontations, which then take the convenient label of ethnically- or religiously-motivated conflict.
History repeats itself in the Maluku Islands, where transmigration has transformed the Christian majority into a minority. While Christians accounted for 68 per cent of the Malukan population in 1945, they currently constitute only 44 per cent of all Malukans. Now a minority in a predominantly-Muslim country, Christian Malukans have been historically marginalised, particularly by the Suharto regime, which imposed nationwide discriminatory employment policies that favoured Muslims over Christians.
Compounded and exacerbated by crushing poverty in the aftermath of the 1997 Asian stock market crash, a long history of institutionalised inequality exploded into inter-communal massacres in the Maluku islands. Commenting on the country's dramatic predicament as a result of the crash, political analyst Jean Duval remarked that few countries in recent history have witnessed such a dramatic reversal of fortunes as Indonesia. Once one of the fastest growing economies in the region -- between 1991 and 1996, real Gross Domestic Product (GDP) growth was estimated at seven per cent -- Indonesia has become the poorest performing one.
The disastrous consequences of the Asian economic meltdown remain palpable. Although other former Asian Tigers like South Korea successfully bounced back in 1999 with a 9.8 per cent growth, Indonesia's growth remained virtually stagnant at 0.4 per cent. The rupiah's devaluation, however, jump-started domestic and international demand for Indonesian products, and when the global price of oil soared, growth reached 2.4 per cent in the first quarter of 2000. In fact, the country's oil and gas exports increased by 15 per cent in dollar terms, largely contributing to this year's modestly improved growth rates.
Nevertheless, conditions remain dismal for the majority of Indonesian workers despite a slight economic recovery. Industrial production is at 60 per cent of its capacity -- the lowest in the region. A staggering 36 million workers are unemployed, and underemployment hovers at 40 per cent. Officials at the Indonesian Ministry of Labour estimate that the unemployment problem could only be adressed if the country achieves a growth level of 15 per cent, an unlikely proposition for the immediate future.
Meanwhile, wages are among the lowest worldwide, with labour costs representing a mere 5 to 10 per cent of production costs. As a consequence of massive unemployment, sub-standard wages and drastic social service cutbacks, abject poverty is rampant nationwide. Sociologists warn of losing an entire generation of youth to poverty-related diseases. It is estimated that 450 children die every day from malnutrition and lack of healthcare.
Given the economic environment, Indonesia's president will need to do more than redress Suharto's ugly legacy of institutionalised religious and ethnic inequality. Should Wahid also fail to attend to creeping unemployment and deteriorating material conditions, he will in all likelihood have failed the test of his young presidency.
