East Timor's independence brings bitter pain for veterans
Muhammad Nafik, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta
East Timor's secession in 1999 has still left bitter pains for many Indonesians, particularly veterans who fought for its integration with Indonesia 27 years ago.
They lashed out at President Megawati Soekarnoputri's decision to visit East Timor to attend the former Indonesian province's independence declaration at midnight on Sunday.
In the eastern suburb of Jakarta, veterans began hoisting Indonesian flags to half-mast in front of their modest homes on Friday to mourn soldiers killed in the military exchanges over East Timor's integration in 1975.
The red-and-white flags would only be taken down when Megawati flew home from the world's newest nation, they said.
The protesting veterans comprised 400 families housed in the Seroja (lotus) military residential complex in Bekasi, some 30 kilometers east of Jakarta.
Seroja was the codename for Indonesia's 1975 military operation to take over East Timor after it had been abandoned by its former colony, Portugal. The operation resulted in the death of thousands of Indonesian troops, most of whom were still young.
Most residents in the low-cost housing complex still bore the scars from gunshot wounds and surgery. Some could be seen with amputated limbs, and several others had lost one or two eyes, or their hearing.
To step up pressure on Megawati to cancel the trip, more than 200 war widows and veterans from the complex, including those rendered handicapped after the occupation, staged a peaceful, but noisy rally outside Merdeka Palace in Central Jakarta on Friday.
Megawati's visit coincides with the country's National Awakening Day celebration, which falls on Monday, and the veterans said Megawati should lead the commemorations at home instead of celebrating with East Timorese on Sunday.
"We feel betrayed and forgotten by the government," retired Sgt. Maj. Soekoro, who chairs a veterans' association based in the Seroja housing complex and who also led Friday's rally, told The Jakarta Post.
The 45-year-old Soekoro lost one of his lungs after having been shot in the right side of his chest during a guerrilla ambush in East Timor in 1978, three years after his arrival there.
He demanded that the government move the graves of Indonesian troops killed in East Timor to their respective hometowns, so their families could more conveniently visit them regularly.
The veterans also asked the government to pay serious attention to the improvement of their welfare.
"Megawati should see us first before she visits East Timor," former Chief Corp. I Made Nirsan, who was among soldiers deployed to East Timor in 1976, said. His left leg was amputated after nine months of service and he was sent home.
In an apparent attempt to calm hostility at her trip, Megawati will lay a wreath at the National Heroes' cemetery in Dili, capital of East Timor.
In response, Soekoro said: "It will be merely a token visit by Megawati. If she really cares about us, she should cancel the trip".
Anger is still strong against then president B.J. Habibie, who decided to allow East Timorese to vote for independence on Aug. 30, 1999, in a UN-brokered ballot.
As a result of the vote, vengeful troops and pro-Jakarta militias went on the rampage, killing hundreds and destroying much of the territory, before retreating to the Indonesian western half of the island, East Nusa Tenggara.
Asmuransyah, a former chief corporal, said he and other veterans were still unable to accept East Timor's breakaway from Indonesia.
"The state has contributed a lot to East Timor. We should have defended it anyhow," he said.
Another victim, Ellen Rantung, a widow whose husband was killed on Nov. 19, 1977 but did not know where his corpse was buried, claimed that she and other members of veteran's families had received no compensation after the campaign that killed more than 3,000 soldiers.