Indonesia-Australia ties: What went wrong?

Indonesia-Australia ties: What went wrong?

By Hal Hill and Chris Manning

This is the first of two articles exploring the low ebb in the
Jakarta and Canberra ties.

CANBERRA (JP): As the Timor crisis deepened in 1999, relations
between Australia and Indonesia soured, and then deteriorated
seriously, sharply and unexpectedly in September-October.

After a decade of seemingly positive and broad-based
expansion, developing into what some came to regard as an
emerging 'special relationship', these two months witnessed
unprecedented recrimination and antagonism.

Although an open, formal rift was avoided, the cooling of
relations was reflected in public statements made at the highest
level.

President Habibie referred in the Indonesian parliament to
Australia's unwelcome 'interference in Indonesian affairs', while
Prime Minister Howard spoke of the need to assert 'Australian
values' in the region rather than kowtowing to the policies of
neighbors, referring (implicitly) especially to Indonesia.

At the heart of the matter was the crisis in East Timor. The
extensive and almost instantaneous coverage by the international
electronic media of the tragic events in Timor, together with its
tendency to highlight isolated and extreme reactions in both
countries, heightened the sense of crisis.

It contributed to emotional responses. Australian unions
boycotted Indonesian ships and Garuda passengers were harassed,
the Indonesian flag was burnt and the Indonesian Ambassador could
not enter his office for over a week.

In Indonesia, in response, there was an almost continuous
demonstration outside the Australian embassy, seemingly (if TV
shots were to be believed) verging on violence.

Australian offices were attacked and Australian citizens
threatened. At the nadir of the relationship in early October
1999, Indonesians saw Australia -- seemingly too enthusiastically
-- take the lead in the formation of a multinational force,
UNAMET, to restore order following the post referendum militia
rampage in Timor.

But many Indonesians saw Australians zealously entering 'their
territory' (as most Indonesians regarded East Timor then), and
behaving in a militaristic and bellicose fashion -- the armed
Australian soldier standing over the defenseless Timorese youth,
for example.

How and why was the relationship so easily and quickly
derailed? And where do we go from here?

Answers to these questions are important, not just for
Australia and Indonesia but, more broadly -- since the two
countries are the dominant powers of the South Pacific and
Southeast Asia respectively -- for the harmony of the region.

It was not just the Australian actions which angered many
Indonesians. Australia's style was unpalatable. Indonesia
expected its neighbor to show some understanding of Jakarta's
predicament (at least that of a weak civilian government), and to
help calm the situation.

But instead Australia appeared to take the lead in condemning
Indonesia. The voice of Australia -- its media, its politicians
and its people -- appeared more strident than any other. Even
liberal-minded and sympathetic Indonesian figures, such as
Sarwono Kusumaatmadja and journalist Wimar Witoelar, saw
Australian reactions as 'arrogant' or 'insensitive', its words
and actions smacking more of a colonial power than an
understanding neighbor.

Conversely, in September, Australians watched each night on
television the abuse of a poor and innocent people, whose only
'crime' was that they clearly and decisively voted for
Independence.

Why couldn't the all-powerful Indonesia military assist these
people and control the violence, Australians (and indeed the
world) asked.

Why was the government in Jakarta so seemingly two-faced in
response to international criticism?

The immediate cause of tension -- a process of decolonization,
strongly opposed by elements of the Indonesian military and
equally strongly supported by large sections of the Australian
public, and by their government -- which erupted in violence, was
as difficult a problem as most neighbors will ever face.

In one sense, it was a credit to the leaders of both countries
that diplomatic relations remained open, despite many calls from
their domestic constituencies for radical action.

But beyond the immediate rift, ill-informed recriminations and
the proliferation of stereotypes revealed that there is still a
fundamental lack of understanding of national characteristics and
political processes in each country -- a lack of understanding
which was all too easily manipulated by mischievous elements on
both sides.

Among these caricatures of each other, Indonesians often view
Australians as white, racist, rich, arrogant, and possessing an
unrivaled propensity to lecture other countries.

On the other hand, many Australians continue to view Indonesia
(even after fall of the Soeharto) as corrupt, brutal,
militaristic, authoritarian, and maintaining an iron grip on a
reluctant non-Javanese citizenry in the eastern provinces.

Like all caricatures, there is an element of truth in these
views. But as generalizations they are seriously distorted.
Many Australians, especially in the media, failed -- or didn't
want -- to recognize, the broad-based improvements in Indonesian
living standards since the mid 1960s, across both socio-economic
groups and its far-flung regions.

Australians have also tended to pay scant attention to deep
historical and cultural sensitivities. Having never been a
poverty stricken colony, never been invaded by a foreign power,
and never had to fight a protracted and bloody war of
Independence, most Australians don't have the historical
perspective to understand Indonesian sensitivities on key issues.

Flag-burning, for example, arouses little passion in
Australia, yet for most Indonesians it is a highly provocative
action.

With a hard-fought Independence achieved just two generations
ago, destruction and defamation of national symbols by a
neighbor is quite shocking to many Indonesians.

The fact that Australians are predominantly rich and white,
and are culturally disposed towards frank and blunt expressions
of opinion abroad -- mirroring the style of domestic debate --
further complicates the issue.

These misperceptions work in both directions, however. It is
true that Australia maintained a discriminatory immigration
policy until about 1970 (the so-called 'White Australia Policy'),
and that for the first 180 years of European settlement the
treatment of aboriginal people was disgraceful.

But things have changed much in Australia over the past 30
years. Australia now has an open, non-discriminatory immigration
program, matched by very few countries.

The resulting societal transformation has been rapid and
Australia is arguably one of the world's most vibrant multi-
cultural societies.

Its generous refugee program has few parallels, certainly in
this region. It is true that this 'multiracialism has been
strongly criticized at home -- the 'Pauline Hanson' factor.

But the immigration program continues to attract bi-partisan
political support. The One Nation party is now in decline and
never captured votes on a scale comparable to similar parties in
the U.S. and Europe.

It is also true that Australia's aboriginal community
(numbering about 250,000 persons) have unacceptably low living
standards. But there are many 'positive discrimination' programs
and the community's problems are openly acknowledged and debated
within and outside government.

In addition, Australia continues to be one of the major donors
to Indonesia, including a generous scholarship program. It
strongly supported the international financial rescue effort in
the wake of the economic crisis and, despite fiscal austerity at
home, the real value of aid has been broadly maintained.

Australia's per capita income is now below both Singapore and
Hong Kong, neither of whom provides aid to Indonesia.

The Australian press is often seen as a complicating factor in
bilateral relations. It is easy to understand Indonesians' anger
here: in recent times, the extraordinarily rude and ill-informed
television interview with the Indonesian ambassador on a
commercial network, and the 60 Minutes team crassly walking into
a 'minefield' by asking queuing East Timorese how they would vote
in the referendum.

More generally, many Australian journalists, with their
single-minded focus on human rights, East Timor, and corruption,
have failed dismally to present a balanced picture of the
complexity of Indonesia.

There is no doubt that, rightly or wrongly, the murder of five
journalists in Balibo in late 1975 has contributed to this press
hostility towards Indonesia. But, while Indonesian dismay is
quite understandable, here too the issue is not amenable to
sweeping generalizations. There have been some very fine
Australian journalists in Indonesia, particularly in the print
media.

Indonesia's sometimes heavy handed press controls needlessly
antagonized the foreign (and of course the domestic) press. And
the problems with the Australian press have arisen in part from
proximity and familiarity.

The New York Times, London's Guardian, Dutch papers, the BBC
and CNN have often been just as critical as Australian outlets.
But because there are not as many of them, and they don't report
as often, the tensions have not been so great.

The authors are respectively professor of economics and head
of the Indonesia Project, Research School of Pacific Studies and
Asian Studies, and Asia-Pacific School of Economics and
Management, the Australian National University.