Gus Dur and Aceh's 'velvet' protest

By Aboeprijadi Santoso

BANDA ACEH (JP): "If a referendum is allowed in East Timor, why not in Aceh? That won't be fair." President Abdurrahman "Gus Dur" Wahid's first response to the mass rally at Great Baiturrachman Mosque in Banda Aceh on Nov. 8, in which protesters demanded a referendum, is now displayed on a banner in the Aceh capital to keep the public reminded of the President's promise.

Any solution to Aceh should consider the show of people power on Nov. 8 -- the first big meeting, perhaps, since the historic all Aceh religious scholars conference (PUSA) in 1950. The one- million-protest rally was peaceful and held virtually without any help from the authorities, which meant that the student bodies and non-governmental organizations which organized it could rely on the society's own resources.

It was a culmination of the rallies all over Aceh and demonstrated the strength of the civil society vis-a-vis the state. No security assurance was requested "yet not even one egg was broken", as one witness put it. The message is clear: the Acehnese do not need the Army to keep peace at home. After all, for them, the security apparatus has become synonymous with insecurity and humiliation.

The self-reliance was also demonstrated at the Dec. 4 province-wide commemoration of the 23rd anniversary of the founding of the Free Aceh Movement (GAM). This, too, proceeded largely peacefully, contrary to Jakarta's warning of a bloodbath and despite a few brutal incidents.

The Nov. 8 and Dec. 4 events are potential milestones in what might become the Acehnese version of, let's say, changes in Eastern Europe 10 years ago. For, just as the Czech opposition forces were united in Prague's "Velvet Revolution" after decades of pain and silence, so the proreferendum rally and the celebration of GAM in Aceh too mean that something painful has run deep into the heart of members of the society, which now unite a great part of Acehnese to peacefully confront the state.

Like it or not, GAM has gained some sympathy. On Dec. 4, activities in Banda Aceh and other towns were almost dead as the public observed both the authorities' and GAM's call to keep the peace and not to raise the flag of GAM. Such public restraint represented society's respectable efforts to prevent casualty. For a country deeply traumatized by past terrors, it was a test of latent anger and frustration. In the countryside, too, no GAM flag was seen in private yards, but the villagers peacefully celebrated the day by raising the crescent, star and stripes red flag along the main roads, on the trees, gates and bridges. Like the rally, the helmet boycott and the ignoring of traffic lights on Nov. 8, it was a mass, and massive, expression of protest. The faces of villagers returning home from the GAM ceremony -- a mixture of euphoria and worry -- remind one of the sight of East Timorese on the ballot day last August: joyful, but also fearful of looming danger.

The refugees crisis provides another example of the intensity of the Aceh problem. It reveals the depth of the Acehnese' trauma. First, the few thousand non-Acehnese, who were driven out of South and West Aceh, were not simply victims of "ethnic cleansing" or a semblance of it, but demonstrated a political frustration since these Javanese and other (trans)migrates were stigmatized as "Anak Anak Soeharto" (Soeharto's children) by the locals. No one could be certain, though, of the real actors; it could be GAM, Army elements or provocateurs.

The second type of refugees was the most dramatic. Thousands of villagers ran simply because they were terrified. Testimonies from camps in Seulimeum, Beureunuen and Darussalam suggest, whenever armed soldiers enter villages, hundreds of poor people will run away. No wonder, however much they suffer, the refugees refuse any help from the government and rely on dedicated student-activists and local supports. This crisis too is a highly political protest at the grass roots level.

At issue, basically, is the accumulation of pain and humiliation. Once the atrocities became widely known (as they should), they created an increasing momentum of public fear and anger. On top of that, many cases -- i.e. the barbaric rapes of women without any mea culpa and compensation, the torture of respectable religious scholars and the killings without the corpses being returned -- symbolize the era of evil and backwardness, the Jahiliah (i.e. the pre-Prophet Mohammad civilization), and are particularly painful.

For Acehnese -- both as Muslim and as Acehnese -- such experiences mean a great humiliation. The public hate is such that they reserve the strongest Acehnese pejorative word pa'i (originally meaning "slave", but here used as "bandit") for the Indonesian Military (TNI) and the Army's Special Force (Kopassus), which are Apa Suh. As the graffiti at the former torture camp Rumah Geudong reveals, the title of "the greatest pa'i" is designated for "the Soeharto-Prabowo regime".

Old wounds remain fresh in Aceh. In March 1993, for example, some 200 villagers in Jeunib, North Aceh, were forced to help identify the GPK, which is the Army's term for GAM, meaning "security disturbance actors", but they said they knew little to nothing. So they had to lie down on a soccer field and the soldiers punished them by running over their bodies. The event left all of them traumatized and many with permanent injuries. As the method failed, the local commander, Col. Syarwan Hamid, came later to Baitil Istiqanah Mosque, Teupin Raya, Pidie, and issued, according to the three witnesses, a strong warning: "Anyone who helps the GPK, even giving one cigarette, will be killed!"

Worse human rights violations were noted in East Timor. But if the Timorese could seek spiritual strength in the local church and call for international support, the Acehnese had to turn to themselves and "to Allah, God Almighty," as they put it. They had to build strong determination, self-confidence and solidarity in their efforts to resist, which, in turn, strengthened both their religious bond and Acehnese identity. It shaped a new consensus, enabling the society to support and unite in rally and celebration, as on Nov. 8 and Dec. 4.

It is this, rather than the small groups of GPK, which revolutionized the Acehnese political arena in recent years. The GAM "only" added a new, but significant dimension into the public consciousness by campaigning on "the historical continuity of Aceh's independence". This in itself did not necessarily make GAM popular; the fact, moreover, that its leadership, the Wali Neugara (head of state) Dr. Chik di Tiro Mohammad Hasan and his staff, reside abroad (in Sweden and Malaysia) and the lack of clarity of its strategy and policy (being not supportive of referendum) has not contributed to its strength. So, although sympathy may be growing for GAM's ideal of independence, it is difficult to gauge the extent of its active support at the grass roots level.

In any case, it was Jakarta's atrocities and humiliation during its military operation campaign (DOM) from 1989 to 1998 which created and sustained the new momentum. Only five to six years ago, few Acehnese knew GAM and many hated what they knew of the GPK, whose actions provoked Army's harsh measures, but once the cycle of state violence started and the horrors widely socialized, the pendulum swung swiftly to the pro-independence camp. Widows (inong balee) who lost husbands at TNI's hand, proudly joined GAM's Cut Nyak Dien unit. Today, it is a general consensus here that Aceh should have a referendum. As the key role shifted from the ulema to the civil movement, i.e. students, NGO's activists and intellectuals, the demand for a referendum with independence option becomes inevitable and nonnegotiable.

Time is running short for Gus Dur. Last July, when he planned a trip to East Timor and Aceh, he told Radio Netherlands, "As a nationalist, I wish both will remain parts of the Republic, but as a democrat, I know, I should respect their rights to self- determination". The tension between the principle of nationalism and human rights and democracy hinted here, should encourage one to rethink on our nationalism, and search for a new discourse.

Gus Dur has been consistent on East Timor, but on Aceh, he says, as president, he has to work with others, including TNI. Attempts to force a hasty solution by repression, or even limited martial law, will be very dangerous. With too many atrocities perpetrated by the Army and firmly kept in the memory of the Acehnese, TNI has little moral ground left to deal with Aceh. As TNI only has a few seats (which it was "appointed")in the legislature, its political weight too should be much reduced. One wonders, then, why TNI still assumes the same role and moral position as before, and why Gus Dur should also ask the generals to decide on Aceh. As Gus Dur implies, Aceh is a big test of Indonesia's new democracy.

The writer is an Indonesian journalist with Radio Netherlands, Hilversum. He visited Aceh recently.