The Acehnese deserve better from us

The Acehnese deserve better from us

Anthony Reid, The Straits Times, Asia News Network, Singapore

The magnitude of the devastation visited on Aceh on Dec. 26 is
almost beyond comprehension. No natural disaster in Indonesian,
or indeed Southeast Asian, history comes close to the mounting
toll of death and destruction of this undersea earthquake and
tsunamis. The whole thickly populated coastal strip from
Lhokseumawe in the east to Meulaboh in the west appears to have
been devastated.

In the district of West Aceh, where communication is very
difficult at the best of times, life appears to have almost
vanished from all the coastal towns and villages, normally home
to about 200,000 people. Only 200 living people were found by the
first relief unit to be able to land in Meulaboh, its capital,
from a pre-tsunami population of about 60,000. While one hopes
that many were able to flee inland, they will face mounting
difficulties to stay alive as unwanted guests of the scattered
hill villages.

The provincial capital, Banda Aceh, normally home to 200,000
people and to most of the military and civilian infrastructure,
has been devastated. The Indonesian disaster response has been
tragically slow, but little more could be expected given the
disruption to military and civilian facilities. Although the
military has 30,000 men on a war footing in Aceh, it appears to
have been largely incapacitated by the disaster. Reportedly, only
one of its helicopters in the province survived.

Even worse is likely to come, as the lack of clean water and
adequate food and shelter takes its toll on the survivors. Those
bringing international aid encounter disorganization,
demoralization and distrust between the military and people. They
need clarity as to who is in charge.

This appalling disaster comes after more than a century of
misery for the stoic people of this richly endowed region. Aceh
has had only a few decades of peace since being invaded by the
Dutch in 1873 with very little warning. Forty years of bitter
resistance to Dutch occupation lost Aceh perhaps a fifth of its
population and transformed it from one of Southeast Asia's more
prosperous and strategically important centers to an embittered
backwater.

Aceh was effectively under military occupation by the Dutch
until 1942 and the Japanese until 1945. After a brief experience
of running its own show in 1945 to 1951, it was again under
military occupation in 1953 to 1962, during the Daud Beureu'eh
rebellion, and in 1989 to 1998, when then president Soeharto's
army sought to suppress the Aceh independence movement (GAM) of
Hasan di Tiro. Still, GAM became very popular under democratic
conditions after Soeharto's fall.

Finally, since May 2003, a military solution has again been
attempted, and thousands more people have been killed in military
offensives and punitive actions, without notably removing the
core of resistance.

Throughout this emergency period, foreign journalists, aid
workers and others have been excluded from the province, as the
government sought to remove Aceh from international headlines.

Having suffered the brutal militarization of its institutions
and its society for over a century, now Aceh has been hit by a
colossal natural disaster, the losses of which on a single day
dwarf even the tens of thousands that the region has lost to
warfare.

To its credit, the international community has also responded
in an unprecedented way. The military forces of Singapore, the
United States and Australia are already in Aceh dispensing
desperately needed supplies, and US$2 billion (S$3.3 billion) has
been pledged in aid to the affected regions, of which at least
half should in fairness be destined for Aceh. The aid givers have
their first chance at the Jakarta summit on Thursday to try to
ensure that Aceh's poisonous politics do not again negate all
efforts for assistance.

In catastrophes such as this, military forces are best able to
deliver aid quickly, and the foreign military units naturally
look to their local counterparts to guide and direct. But in
Aceh, the military has been the major part of the problem, not
the solution.

Over the past 50 years it has killed and rendered homeless too
many Acehnese for there to be trust between people and army. The
carefully constructed reform legislation to give the widest
possible autonomy to Aceh (the Nanggroe Aceh Darussalam or NAD
law of 2001) has been completely vitiated by military control of
all the levers of power since May 2003.

The need for the underfunded military to raise money from
various business and protection rackets has ensured that little
of Aceh's wealth has yet benefited its people.

The foreign aid, in other words, must be delivered to the
people who need it as directly as possible, without the mediation
of the Indonesian military. The best way to ensure this would be
for the summit meeting to endorse and carry forward the ceasefire
that both GAM and President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono have said
they favor. TNI units on the ground in Aceh have been quoted as
ignoring this ceasefire, and the higher command needs
encouragement in its resolve to bring them into line.

Both TNI and GAM need to be disarmed during the long process
of reconstruction, with law enforcement becoming the
responsibility of Aceh police stiffened by international police
units under United Nations' responsibility.

Both TNI and GAM forces may be able to assist in the
reconstruction of areas where they are strong, but only if they
are disarmed while doing so, and thereby unable to continue the
division and brutalization of the populace.

The Susilo government has, to its credit, declared open access
to Aceh for international aid givers. This runs counter to the
instincts of the local military, and again the international
community will need to be clear about permanently full access,
not just for aid givers, but for the journalists who will sustain
global interest in the problem.

The government of former president Megawati Soekarnoputri, in
which Susilo was largely responsible for Aceh policy, had allowed
international peace monitors (from Thailand and the Philippines)
during the peace agreement of 2002 to 2003.

This crisis demands an even more generous response towards
accepting the internationalization of Aceh's reconstruction. The
UN needs to assume authority for the international aid effort, in
cooperation with Alwi Shihab, the civilian minister President
Susilo has placed in charge. Only the demilitarization of Aceh
under some form of international guarantee can make possible the
full implementation of the NAD autonomy law and the emergence
through elections of a leadership Acehnese can trust.

Acehnese have suffered enough. They deserve this.

The writer is director of the Asia Research Institute at the
National University of Singapore and the author of three books on
Aceh's history.