Keep E. Timor out of local politics

By Onghokham

JAKARTA (JP): On the occasion of Bishop Carlos Felipe Ximenes Belo receiving the Nobel Peace Prize, for which we heartily congratulate him, some thoughts on East Timor are called for.

The Portuguese have been in East Timor for a very long time. Although their first arrival and settlement has been forgotten, in l520, more than 70 years before the Dutch arrived in the Indonesian archipelago, it appears they had built some fortresses on the island.

Some time after l640, when Portugal "regained" its independence from Spain by rejecting its union with that country through the establishment of its own royal house, the Dutch recognized the Portuguese settlement in East Timor. A treaty with the king of Kupang (West Timor) allowed the Dutch to build a fortress on that side of the island.

For centuries, the two sides lived more or less in peace, although the final boundaries between Dutch West Timor and Portuguese East Timor were not demarcated by treaty until l908 through the arbitration of a Swiss diplomat, except during the outbreak of the Pacific War (l941-1945), when a Dutch-Australian army occupied Portuguese Timor in order to prevent the Japanese from taking it over. The Japanese eventually occupied it though, as they did with almost the entire archipelago.

After the war, East Timor was returned to Portugal. For centuries, Dutch West Timor and Portuguese East Timor could coexist peacefully and were not in any way disturbing each other because the island of Timor was not on the main trading routes and was relatively poor. Probably only pure historical accidents led to the early settlements by European powers. For a brief period, the island might have been a place of contention among the two great European powers, because Holland as well as Portugal could be called great powers during the l6th and l7th centuries.

However, Portuguese Timor might have lived in peace were it not for the fact that it was situated in what became a Dutch archipelago and a Dutch sea, presently known as the Indonesian Ocean. In other words, it was isolated for centuries. Meanwhile, Portugal itself declined following its heyday in the l6th century, having become the first European empire in the East and a pioneer in colonialism, a source of its national pride until today.

Portugal, one should remember, has always been considered as an underdeveloped country. It was poor, meaning there was almost no government representation in its colonies, especially those colonies which did not produce anything. Although the writer has no statistics on the number of colonial officials in East Timor, one might suppose that it was very small.

The church and missionaries, instead of the metropolitan authorities, might have run the island, just as Spain did in the Philippines. Compare this with the rich Netherlands, which had two or three times more Dutch (European) civil servants to run their empire than the British in India. The Dutch were suffocating the Indonesians with their concerns, as many foreign observers (such as Furnivall, Bousquet and Amry Vandenbosch) remarked.

It has been said that many post-colonial states have often adopted the ways -- in an even more extreme fashion -- of their former colonial powers. In other words, Indonesia might be considered as behaving as the Dutch did in the colonial period, when they played the role of "nursing maid" in even more extreme ways.

Perhaps in most parts of the archipelago, people might prefer less government. Nowhere is this need for less government perhaps more felt than in East Timor. East Timor was practically autonomous because of the sorry state of its colonial power. Though this power was weak and could easily be overthrown, the people of East Timor did not feel the need to do anything about it because it was almost non-existent. A nurse's role is of course always well-meant and if rejected, the consequences can be very painful.

However, colonial nurses must face realities.

Even aid, financial subsidies and all other physical improvements could be viewed as objectionable, although well- intentioned. For example, American aid during the Cold War era often had this effect.

Moreover, East Timorese society is poor and the region perhaps a bit arid, which are sources of depression and frustration to government officials, police, Army members and others who are sent there from other parts of Indonesia.

Even in Jakarta, Java and other areas of the archipelago, there have been reports of excesses by the government apparatus. Recently, a young man was thrown into the Kali Malang River in Central Jakarta when the government apparatus raided stalls along the river. The man could not swim and later died. Human rights bodies are now busy investigating the case. There are many such instances in Jakarta, Java and elsewhere, and not only in East Timor.

If events like these happen in East Timor, they become political, because the whole world is watching them. In Jakarta and other parts of Indonesia, they become the concern of human rights bodies, students and others. In East Timor, however, they are politically sensitive. Clearly, if Indonesia wants to win its case in East Timor, there should be an extraordinary high degree of discipline among its government apparatus. Human rights abuses in Indonesia are of a local or at most national scale. But those same events in East Timor are of a global scale. Ironically, it was the Indonesian government which put East Timor on the map.

How sensitive people can be about colonial officials' attitudes toward and treatment of the people, Indonesians can testify. Remember that until today, the Dutch colonial posture of arms akimbo (while giving orders), is until now considered by society as very rude. The other thing is touching one's head or hair, which might have been thought of as the most patronizing gesture. Those arrogant attitudes of colonial officials created a nationalist anticolonial movement once.

Until now, officials' arrogance has only created problems in East Timor. However, with a rising middle class in many regions of Indonesia, attitudes of officials might create tensions. It is not possible to have a well-educated and well-to-do society with a government apparatus still behaving as if it was l965 or l966.

As mentioned above, Indonesia brought East Timor into the globalization process. Indonesia "freed" it from its centuries- old isolation of being a Portuguese enclave in a Dutch sea and later Indonesian ocean. All the problems of a sudden overwhelming governing apparatus with rules and regulations in schools and standardization of everything, in a place where there were no rules before, aggravated the situation in East Timor.

We, Indonesians must realize from our own historical experience how painful a process internationalization can be. Think of the terrible events of Dutch colonial history. It is even more painful if it comes suddenly and with all the modern technology of the 20th century, rather than that of the l8th and l9th centuries.

On the other hand, the results of this internationalization for East Timor has been sensational. The two Nobel Peace Prize recipients speak for themselves. The award, on an international level, is indeed highly esteemed, yet painful. But it might also be rewarding and prideful.

This was similarly the case with Indonesia's struggle for independence, which had perhaps caused more loss of lives and suffering than during the entire length of the colonial period, especially since it was contemporary and still fresh in our memories.

We must remember that Asia's modern history has often been very brutal. True imperialist powers were partly to blame in every circumstance: the opium war, Armritsal, the so-called police actions and others. Nevertheless, determining the origin of this brutality and who is to blame solves very little in life. In making judgments, one should keep historical perspectives in mind. Until now, the problem of East Timor has only been discussed as an international problem. However, in the end, it has a national impact on us and perhaps largely through our own doing.

First of all, the awarding of the Nobel Peace Prize this year has internationalized Indonesia's own human rights problems, which fill newspapers and keep human rights bodies busy these days. Perhaps even less than East Timor itself.

Indonesian society and government has been less prepared to enter globalization in this field. Its reactions were very sharp as we know from the protest against Bishop Belo.

This national impact is even more alarming. It did not come suddenly. It started with the November 1994 incident when Bugis, an ethnic group from South Sulawesi, and other migrants were driven out of East Timor following the stabbing of an East Timorese by a Buginese. It was a racial and religious riot against the national majority on an island where they were a minority. This in itself could be divisive. Worst still, the controversy surrounding Bishop Belo was almost along religious lines and seemingly allowed to develop as such. This is like feeding a cancer on a relatively healthy body and swelling it artificially.

East Timor should be kept away as much as possible from the realm of national politics. It could really become a cancer threatening us with disintegration and the sorrows which the U.S. involvement in Vietnam brought on that nation or the Russian involvement in Afghanistan.

We certainly would not like to endure the same divisiveness as experienced by the two great superpowers just for a victory in East Timor. The price could be too high. Both countries allowed international affairs to deeply impact the national politics of their respective societies.

The colonial history of any country has always shown that it should never be a part of the national politics of the metropolitan societies. Therefore, colonial expansion has always been paid for by the people of the colonies and never by the metropolitan power. However, one usually never learns from history. If we did, then we all might be happier.

The writer is a historian based in Jakarta.