Aceh students stage protest for referendum
JAKARTA (JP): Hundreds of university and senior high school students took to the streets of Lhokseumawe in Aceh on Tuesday to protest the tearing down of street banners demanding a referendum.
Their protest occurred as a group of 19 Acehnese leaders warned President B.J. Habibie in Jakarta to keep his promise to punish human rights violators in the troubled province.
Liliwangsa Military Commander Col. Johnny Wahab said the students were outraged because unidentified military officers tore down the banners on Monday night despite his earlier assurance to students their activities would not be disturbed.
"Their banners have been replaced. Posters demanding a referendum are not against the law because actually they are merely asking for a kind of general election," Johnny told The Jakarta Post in a telephone interview.
He said there were no arrests. However, he said the military found indications that groups like the Free Aceh Movement were attempting to provoke students. Members of the groups have been arrested, Johnny said without elaborating.
Separately, chairman of Aceh Students Coalition for Reforms (Karma) Muhammad Saleh said the protest was part of the students' campaigns to press their demand for referendum and to force the military to stop human rights abuses.
Saleh, who told Habibie last month not to voice empty promises for Aceh, said the students planned to build at least one coordination post in each of the province's 78 districts.
"The purpose is to familiarize the referendum and to monitor the violations of human rights, and we will employ two students at each post," Saleh said.
He said the Acehnese were enthusiastic about the plan and were contributing to building the posts.
Separately, Usman Hasan, Habibie's chief advisor on the province, said the Acehnese would only forgive the government if the President fulfilled his pledge to completely settle grievances from the 10-year military operation in the province.
"If legal action against human rights violators during the military operation is not launched, all that has been done physically will be meaningless," Usman said after meeting with Habibie at Merdeka Palace.
During a March 26 visit to Aceh, Habibie held a dialog with about 2,000 people at Baiturrahman Mosque in Banda Aceh.
Many demands were made on the government during the meeting and students demanded a referendum. Habibie apologized for human rights abuses during the military operations from 1989 to 1998, and promised to punish any military officers found guilty of atrocities. He also promised to compensate victims.
Other pledges included repairing the province's railways, modernizing the former free port of Sabang and the reburial of victims of military operations.
Habibie stated that the People's Consultative Assembly had the final say on the referendum demand.
"People are still demanding referendum but they also are realistic," said Usman, a former Golkar deputy chairman.
According to the latest government data, 1,021 were killed, 864 are listed as missing and 1,376 were widowed in the period of military operations. Also 680 houses were burned down.
There were 405 deaths in Pidie, 346 in North Aceh and 270 in East Aceh.
"We told him (Habibie) that... the people of Aceh are awaiting the realization of what he promised at Baiturrahman," Usman said.
Chairman of Aceh's Muslim Students Association (HMI) Saleh said students initially were emotional and wanted to boycott the general election in June.
"But now they see elections as one of the possible ways out for our problem," said Saleh, who was also present at the meeting with Habibie on Tuesday. (prb)