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POLITICS-INDONESIA: Aceh Savours Tsunami’s Gift of Peace

Marwaan Macan-Markar

BANGKOK, Dec 12 2006 (IPS) - As it approaches the second anniversary of the Indian Ocean tsunami, the Indonesian province of Aech, which took the worst beating, is basking in a spirit of hope that would have been hard to imagine two years ago.

But that spirit stems from the ballots – not the heroic rehabilitation effort along the battered coastline – cast in a largely peaceful and historic election for the top provincial and district government posts in that oil and gas-rich region on the northern tip of Indonesia.

The victors in this unprecedented poll, conducted Monday, include those held in custody by the Indonesian government when the devastating waves struck the Aceh coastline on Dec. 26, 2004.

Irwandi Yusuf was held for his role as a leader of the separatist Free Aceh Movement (or GAM, in Acehenese). On Tuesday, the 46-year-old and his running mate Muhammad Nazar were savouring their landslide victory, capturing nearly 39 percent of Monday’s vote. Their closest rivals only got 17 percent.

‘’This will strengthen the peace process. This is a milestone,” Juri Laas, spokesperson of the Aceh Monitoring Mission (AMM), told IPS over phone from Banda Aceh, the capital of that Indonesian province.

Jakarta appears keen to cement this achievement judging by its early reaction to the poll in a region where its troops were locked in conflict with GAM for nearly three decades. Close to 15,000 people were killed during this separatist insurgency.

‘’The government will respect the outcome regardless of who wins… We must congratulate whoever wins the elections,” Indonesian Vice President Jusuf Kalla was quoted as having told ‘Antara,’ the country’s state news agency, according to ‘The Jakarta Post,’ newspaper.

This week’s poll came after weeks of an open election campaign between candidates associated with GAM, such as Irwandi -who besides being trained in guerrilla warfare was also the rebel movement’s spokesman – and other contenders with links to Jakarta.

The election was part of the peace deal that was signed by the Indonesian government and GAM leaders in August 2005 to help move this troubled region down the road to reconciliation. The clamour for peace arose out of the devastating impact of the tsunami, which resulted in over 165,000 deaths in Aceh, and over 530,000 people being displaced.

In all, the tsunami killed over 220,000 people, left millions homeless and crushed the coastline in 11 countries across the Indian Ocean. There were expectations that Sri Lanka, suffered the second highest death toll after Aceh, with 35,399 fatalities, may also use the opportunity of an unprecedented natural disaster help restore peace in that island nation’s bloody ethnic conflict. But, instead, a lack of sincerity and roadblocks placed by the Sri Lankan government and the Tamil Tiger rebels has seen the conflict escalate.

The AMM, which was mandated to monitor the peace agreement that was signed in Helsinki, the Finnish capital, oversaw GAM’s decommissioning of weapons and the disbanding its armed wing. The rebels also gave up their demand for an independent homeland. For its part, the Indonesian government had to remove non-essential military regiments and police forces and also grant an amnesty to GAM fighters and prisoners with alleged links to the rebels.

In fact, Dec. 15 will be the last day for the AMM, a sign of confidence in the distance this peace process has travelled. ‘’We are positive that peace has been achieved and there is a sufficient level of security for us to close the mission,” said AMM’s Laas.

Monday’s poll, furthermore, appears to have consolidated the hold GAM’s new generation of leaders, like Irwandi, have over the separatist movement’s old guard, who were led by Acehnese men living in exile in Sweden. Helping the likes of Irwandi is the broad sweep of support received by the former, younger rebel leaders like him contesting as independents – since GAM has still not fully transformed into a political entity.

‘’I was surprised that they pulled off a victory of this proportion with support from the towns and provinces,” Sidney Jones, a leading Indonesia analyst for the International Crisis Group (ICG), the Brussels-based think tank, told IPS during a telephone interview from Banda Aceh. ‘’The combination is a strong sentiment endorsing GAM’s new leaders.”

Equally important, she says, is that the poll throws weight behind GAM to pursue its political agenda without having to turn to violence. ‘’The people have given GAM a clear message to achieve change peacefully, through the political process.”

Such twin scenarios appeared far from certain on the eve of the poll, as ICG pointed out in a Nov. 29 report, which warned that a rift within GAM’s old guard and new was ‘’complicating” Aceh’s transition towards peace and stability.

‘’There will inevitably be internal recriminations about who lost what and whether GAM could have won if it has stayed united,” added the ICG report. ‘’It might not be a bad thing for GAM to win a few district offices but lose the governorship.”

Irwandi did the opposite, by leading his team to win the governor’s and vice-governor’s post. They were the two main stakes in a poll that also saw candidates run for posts to head 21 local districts. Media reports from Banda Aceh say that some 75 percent of Aceh’s 2.6 million registered voters turned out for the polls.

And while Aceh waits for the official polling results to be released, on Jan. 2, its first elected governor has sent a reassuring message to his former adversary in battle. ‘’We will ask the central government to help us in implementing the Helsinki agreement,” Irwandi was quoted as having told ‘Antara’ following Monday’s poll, according to ‘The Jakarta Post.’