Freedom's disappointments
Riots and incursions mar nation-building
The Economist March 20th, 2003
East Timor
DILI
INDEPENDENCE has turned out to be a bittersweet pill for East Timor.
After
anti-government riots last year, the country has now been hit by a wave
of
militia incursions from West Timor, which is still part of Indonesia.
With
the United Nations' support mission due to leave next year, there is a
growing danger that this experiment in UN nation-building could end up
an
embarrassing mess.
The attacks from West Timor are believed to have been carried out by
East
Timorese. Some 30,000 East Timorese remain there, most with links to
Indonesia, including militiamen wanted for crimes committed in 1999, when
the East was still in Indonesian hands. The UN is in charge of national
defence until it hands over to a locally-run defence force, but it has
had
no international staff in West Timor since three of its officials were
murdered there in 2000. However, its staff have gathered evidence against
militiamen who committed crimes in East Timor and identifying their
sponsors in the Indonesian army.
A new problem is the growth of a quasi-religious organisation called
Colimau 2000, which operates in the border area. Its creed is a mixture
of
Timorese animism and Roman Catholicism. There are fears that militiamen
crossing the porous border from East Timor may infiltrate it.
President Xanana Gusmão and his government are more concerned
with domestic
matters. Most East Timorese are still eking out a living as subsistence
farmers, disappointed with the meagre fruits of independence. The ruling
Fretilin party has lost some of the glamour that brought it election
victory in 2001. Its intentions are suspect. Opposition politicians believe
it wants to establish a one-party state. Mari Alkatiri, the prime minister,
said recently that Fretilin could be in power for 50 years.
Mr Alkatiri is not at all popular. Some of his properties were destroyed
in
rioting in Dili in December. His family, of Yemeni origin, owns substantial
amounts of land around Dili. He is in the ascendant within Fretilin, but
the party itself is divided. It includes moderates whose views are close
to
those of the opposition. There is also a small but influential faction
tied
to Rogerio Lobato, minister of internal administration, who before
independence spent much time in Angola, where he once went to jail for
diamond smuggling.
As president, Mr Gusmão has been a stabilising influence so far.
Before
independence, Fretilin pushed through a constitution with a division of
powers between president and prime minister. Everyone knew that Mr Gusmão
would win the presidency and cynics say the aim was simply to curtail
his
power. Mr Gusmão is resented by hardliners in Fretilin for steering
the
party away from Marxist dogma. But he is formally commander-in-chief of
the
army and all the senior officers have personal ties of allegiance to him.
With much bad blood from the past, a weak economy and the militias over
the
border poised to make trouble, many people are wondering whether there
could be a new civil war. Mario Carrascalão, who was governor of
East Timor
for ten years under Indonesia, thinks probably not. These days, in
poverty-stricken East Timor, there are simply not enough weapons about
to
have a civil war.