article 13

Tokyo Journal, November 1999

by Richard Humphries

Election time in Japan has usually meant identikit campaign posters on designated town walls and slow-moving trucks with painfully irritating loudspeakers. There' s even the occasional candidate in person, usually wearing a silly sash and holding forth at some train station entrance. And don' t forget the bevy of young, short-skirted female assistants, chosen, one suspects, not necessarily for their grasp of the issues.

Election time this summer in East Timor was a far more serious affair. The issue was stark, simple and, as it turned out, one with deadly consequences. Was it to be autonomy within Indonesia or outright independence? 78.5 percent chose the latter but the idea of "being a good loser" has not taken much hold within the Indonesian military nor with its creatures, the militias. Horrendous massacres, deportations, and large-scale destruction of property and pillaging were perpetrated upon a defenseless people, forcing a more effective international response.

There were signs in August, in fact well before, of the coming trouble, but there also were moments when it was easy to be lulled by the election process. On a previous visit in 1997, I' d noticed a pronounced sense of fear, a lack of smiles, and many quickly averted glances. Foreigners were followed and chatted up by obvious spies. Also, there had been a noisy and disconcerting midnight visit by military and police intelligence at my hotel and quiet suggestions by locals to avoid certain towns because of the "situation."

This time there were smiles, expressions of hope for the future and even at times exuberance. With hundreds of journalists around and over 1000 UNAMET (United Nations Assistance Mission in East Timor) personnel and outside observers as well, keeping tabs on all the foreigners seemed beyond the spooks' means. No more bedtime stories from military intelligence either. Sensing a bit of a power shift, the Timorese people gained in confidence.

Dili was an odd place. Remnants of the Portuguese colonial style of architecture were mixed with more modern and uglier cantonment-style structures contributed by Indonesia, Perhaps the most harmonious elements were the local people' s homes, simple but sturdy and well-cared for. One got around the town either by walking or by taking one of the town' s decrepit blue taxis. These averaged 20 years in age, looked older, and were often held together, barely, by string.

The main UNAMET compound in Dili's Balide district bustled with multinational activity. Scores of journalists, UN workers, diplomats, government officials and NGO representatives came and went. Everywhere one saw Land Rovers, Nissan Pathfinders and other four-wheel drives with their distinctive UN markings.

The sense of exuberance was very visible at the UNAMET voter registration centers, in Dili and elsewhere. Long lines would form early in the day and continue throughout. Upon producing some valid documentation of identity, people were given certificates that would allow them to vote on August 30. These were displayed proudly to visitors and later safely kept at home. One American UNAMET electoral officer in the town of Liquica related that when she and her colleagues first arrived in outlying villages, people came streaming out of their homes with tears in their eyes, "as if Jesus Christ himself had made an appearance." To many observers, speaking privately, there seemed little doubt as to what the voting outcome would be.

Nonetheless, some in power in the province may have thought a majority vote for autonomy was possible. Considering that the Indonesian invasion in 1975 had led to such untold death, perhaps a third of the then 700,000 population, and prolonged misery, this should have seemed hardly credible. Still, there were claims that extensive road building and other infrastructure developments, courtesy of Indonesia, had raised the general level of prosperity. For that the people should be suitably grateful, or so the generals and their collaborators thought. As this "cruel to be kind" policy lacked a certain finesse, a mixture of propaganda and outright intimidation was added to the mix to sway voters.

For an example of the former, the local Indonesian TV station followed and deliberately copied, somewhat in style though hardly in content, UNAMET' s 30 minute, 7 PM broadcasts with ones of its own. Where UNAMET showed people registering and smiling, Indonesian TV had interviews with pro-autonomy people and pro-autonomy parades. One parade, of militia members in trucks cruising through Dili, suffered from a bit too wide of a camera angle though. There were no cheering throngs, only empty sidewalks. Where the UNAMET program ended with an uplifting song in Tetun (the most common local language), "...We will vote with happiness, UNAMET will show us the way...," sung by an ecstatic Timorese ensemble, the Indonesian one ended with a subdued pro-autonomy Tetun song sung by a young, exceedingly pouty-faced woman who was shown from a bewildering variety of disjointed camera perspectives.

The policy of intimidation was far more serious. There were attacks on UNAMET workers, attempts to separate local Timorese UN workers from foreign ones and several killings. In some areas people would register to vote and return home only to find their houses had been burned by militias. Thousands fled to the hills. In many towns, militias owned the night and in some the day as well. At Liquica, a tense and creepy militia-infested town, the same American electoral officer stated, "Just look around you. There are supposed to be 22,000 people in this town. Do you see them?"

In Ainaro, well to the south of Dili, the atmosphere was much the same. The downtown area was relatively empty and far too quiet. The town' s odd major "attraction," the statue on a pedestal of a long-forgotten Portuguese admiral, stood in front of Ainaro' s only hotel. Some hotels in East Timor have the sinister reputation of having been used as torture and interrogation centers. Whether or not this one, the Super Semar, did, I didn' t know, but it certainly had that atmosphere. Situated next to the oversized main police station, it' s design was straight out of "The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari." The main corridor was cavernous, gloomy, and as uninviting as the manager. The rooms had their furnishings positioned in a deliberate attempt to avoid any rational symmetry. It was not a place to rest easily.

An Australian UNAMET official in Ainaro advised us, "The next town is Cassa. You don' t really want to stop there, and you definitely do not want to be there after 4 PM. It is the headquarters of the Mahidi militia." Mahidi is short for Mati Hidup Demi Integrasi, which translates as "dead or alive with integration [with Indonesia]." Exceedingly violent, it was one of 13 such groups, one for each region of East Timor. These particular ones (other paramilitaries had existed before) were formed at the beginning of this year by elements of the Indonesian military and security apparatus as "village guards." Each militia had its Timorese "Consiglieri" with someone in the Indonesian command structure quietly playing the role of Don Corleone for the whole lot.

Indonesian policy in East Timor had long been to put the local people "first", that is to say, in front of its soldiers. In 1981, during the notorious "pagar betis" (fence of legs) campaign, 80,000 civilians were conscripted to walk in front of the soldiers on large-scale military sweeps against Falintil, the resistance army. The present use of militias represented just another variation of this technique.

As we passed through Cassa, we noticed many young men wearing black T-shirts. On the fronts of those shirts were small Indonesian flags, and on the backs the letters MAHIDI were displayed in big, red letters. Perhaps imitating those gun-loving American racists of the Timothy McVeigh variety, who feel incomplete without apparel from Army Surplus catalogues, the Mahidi and its fellow militias were also looking to achieve a fashion identity. It made them no less deadly. We had no problem as it wasn' t their day to be bad. Two days later, however, the Mahidi attacked the UNAMET center in Ainaro, wounding the Australian official.

The big question in August was---did the intimidation campaign have a chance of success? One pro-independence East Timorese thought that very unlikely. He said that people, even in the militia-controlled areas, were not fooled. They knew exactly what was going on. If they had to stick an Indonesian flagpole on their property to avoid it being ransacked and burned, so be it. If someone wielding a machete wanted to know how they' d vote they knew what to say to keep him from winging out. They all knew that on August 30, they could vote as they liked. "This chance will never come again if we don' t take it," they were advised.

The people of East Timor took that chance and voted, despite the intimidation, in a way that left no doubt as to their choice. And they have paid an enormous price. We, as individuals, as groups, as nations, and as members of the rather nebulous "international community" now owe them a huge debt of honor to see to it that their choice becomes real. (RH)


	Uneasy August in Timor Tokyo Journal, November 1999 by Richard Humphries Election time in Japan has usually meant identikit campaign posters on designated town walls and slow-moving trucks with painfully irritating loudspeakers. There' s even the occasional candidate in person, usually wearing a silly sash and holding forth at some train station entrance. And don' t forget the bevy of young, short-skirted female assistants, chosen, one suspects, not necessarily for their grasp of the issues. Election time this summer in East Timor was a far more serious affair. The issue was stark, simple and, as it turned out, one with deadly consequences. Was it to be autonomy within Indonesia or outright independence? 78.5 percent chose the latter but the idea of "being a good loser" has not taken much hold within the Indonesian military nor with its creatures, the militias. Horrendous massacres, deportations, and large-scale destruction of property and pillaging were perpetrated upon a defenseless people, forcing a more effective international response. There were signs in August, in fact well before, of the coming trouble, but there also were moments when it was easy to be lulled by the election process. On a previous visit in 1997, I' d noticed a pronounced sense of fear, a lack of smiles, and many quickly averted glances. Foreigners were followed and chatted up by obvious spies. Also, there had been a noisy and disconcerting midnight visit by military and police intelligence at my hotel and quiet suggestions by locals to avoid certain towns because of the "situation." This time there were smiles, expressions of hope for the future and even at times exuberance. With hundreds of journalists around and over 1000 UNAMET (United Nations Assistance Mission in East Timor) personnel and outside observers as well, keeping tabs on all the foreigners seemed beyond the spooks' means. No more bedtime stories from military intelligence either. Sensing a bit of a power shift, the Timorese people gained in confidence. Dili was an odd place. Remnants of the Portuguese colonial style of architecture were mixed with more modern and uglier cantonment-style structures contributed by Indonesia, Perhaps the most harmonious elements were the local people' s homes, simple but sturdy and well-cared for. One got around the town either by walking or by taking one of the town' s decrepit blue taxis. These averaged 20 years in age, looked older, and were often held together, barely, by string. The main UNAMET compound in Dili's Balide district bustled with multinational activity. Scores of journalists, UN workers, diplomats, government officials and NGO representatives came and went. Everywhere one saw Land Rovers, Nissan Pathfinders and other four-wheel drives with their distinctive UN markings. The sense of exuberance was very visible at the UNAMET voter registration centers, in Dili and elsewhere. Long lines would form early in the day and continue throughout. Upon producing some valid documentation of identity, people were given certificates that would allow them to vote on August 30. These were displayed proudly to visitors and later safely kept at home. One American UNAMET electoral officer in the town of Liquica related that when she and her colleagues first arrived in outlying villages, people came streaming out of their homes with tears in their eyes, "as if Jesus Christ himself had made an appearance." To many observers, speaking privately, there seemed little doubt as to what the voting outcome would be. Nonetheless, some in power in the province may have thought a majority vote for autonomy was possible. Considering that the Indonesian invasion in 1975 had led to such untold death, perhaps a third of the then 700,000 population, and prolonged misery, this should have seemed hardly credible. Still, there were claims that extensive road building and other infrastructure developments, courtesy of Indonesia, had raised the general level of prosperity. For that the people should be suitably grateful, or so the generals and their collaborators thought. As this "cruel to be kind" policy lacked a certain finesse, a mixture of propaganda and outright intimidation was added to the mix to sway voters. For an example of the former, the local Indonesian TV station followed and deliberately copied, somewhat in style though hardly in content, UNAMET' s 30 minute, 7 PM broadcasts with ones of its own. Where UNAMET showed people registering and smiling, Indonesian TV had interviews with pro-autonomy people and pro-autonomy parades. One parade, of militia members in trucks cruising through Dili, suffered from a bit too wide of a camera angle though. There were no cheering throngs, only empty sidewalks. Where the UNAMET program ended with an uplifting song in Tetun (the most common local language), "...We will vote with happiness, UNAMET will show us the way...," sung by an ecstatic Timorese ensemble, the Indonesian one ended with a subdued pro-autonomy Tetun song sung by a young, exceedingly pouty-faced woman who was shown from a bewildering variety of disjointed camera perspectives. The policy of intimidation was far more serious. There were attacks on UNAMET workers, attempts to separate local Timorese UN workers from foreign ones and several killings. In some areas people would register to vote and return home only to find their houses had been burned by militias. Thousands fled to the hills. In many towns, militias owned the night and in some the day as well. At Liquica, a tense and creepy militia-infested town, the same American electoral officer stated, "Just look around you. There are supposed to be 22,000 people in this town. Do you see them?" In Ainaro, well to the south of Dili, the atmosphere was much the same. The downtown area was relatively empty and far too quiet. The town' s odd major "attraction," the statue on a pedestal of a long-forgotten Portuguese admiral, stood in front of Ainaro' s only hotel. Some hotels in East Timor have the sinister reputation of having been used as torture and interrogation centers. Whether or not this one, the Super Semar, did, I didn' t know, but it certainly had that atmosphere. Situated next to the oversized main police station, it' s design was straight out of "The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari." The main corridor was cavernous, gloomy, and as uninviting as the manager. The rooms had their furnishings positioned in a deliberate attempt to avoid any rational symmetry. It was not a place to rest easily. An Australian UNAMET official in Ainaro advised us, "The next town is Cassa. You don' t really want to stop there, and you definitely do not want to be there after 4 PM. It is the headquarters of the Mahidi militia." Mahidi is short for Mati Hidup Demi Integrasi, which translates as "dead or alive with integration [with Indonesia]." Exceedingly violent, it was one of 13 such groups, one for each region of East Timor. These particular ones (other paramilitaries had existed before) were formed at the beginning of this year by elements of the Indonesian military and security apparatus as "village guards." Each militia had its Timorese "Consiglieri" with someone in the Indonesian command structure quietly playing the role of Don Corleone for the whole lot. Indonesian policy in East Timor had long been to put the local people "first", that is to say, in front of its soldiers. In 1981, during the notorious "pagar betis" (fence of legs) campaign, 80,000 civilians were conscripted to walk in front of the soldiers on large-scale military sweeps against Falintil, the resistance army. The present use of militias represented just another variation of this technique. As we passed through Cassa, we noticed many young men wearing black T-shirts. On the fronts of those shirts were small Indonesian flags, and on the backs the letters MAHIDI were displayed in big, red letters. Perhaps imitating those gun-loving American racists of the Timothy McVeigh variety, who feel incomplete without apparel from Army Surplus catalogues, the Mahidi and its fellow militias were also looking to achieve a fashion identity. It made them no less deadly. We had no problem as it wasn' t their day to be bad. Two days later, however, the Mahidi attacked the UNAMET center in Ainaro, wounding the Australian official. The big question in August was---did the intimidation campaign have a chance of success? One pro-independence East Timorese thought that very unlikely. He said that people, even in the militia-controlled areas, were not fooled. They knew exactly what was going on. If they had to stick an Indonesian flagpole on their property to avoid it being ransacked and burned, so be it. If someone wielding a machete wanted to know how they' d vote they knew what to say to keep him from winging out. They all knew that on August 30, they could vote as they liked. "This chance will never come again if we don' t take it," they were advised. The people of East Timor took that chance and voted, despite the intimidation, in a way that left no doubt as to their choice. And they have paid an enormous price. We, as individuals, as groups, as nations, and as members of the rather nebulous "international community" now owe them a huge debt of honor to see to it that their choice becomes real. (RH)