23 February 2007
The left-wing Acehnese Peoples Party (PRA) will be holding its founding
congress in the provincial capital of Banda Aceh at the end of February. Sydney
University Southeast Asian Studies lecturer Max Lane spoke to Thamrin Ananda,
chairperson of the Preparatory Committee of the PRA.
There have recently been elections for governor and district heads in Aceh.
The governorship and vice-governorship were won by figures from the Free Aceh
Movement (GAM) and from the pro-referendum movement. Has the political struggle
that characterised the situation in Aceh in the 1980s and 1990s ended?
The struggle has not at all ended, but the nature of the problem has changed.
Aceh is becoming increasingly caught in a neoliberal trap of intensified
capitalist exploitation. The natural disasters that Aceh has experienced are
being used by foreign capital to further their economic and political
penetration. All natural resources, especially oil, have been claimed by
foreign companies. The northern part of Aceh has been flooded with foreign
companies, but there has been no improvement in the welfare of the people.
The key institutions of state power are also being taken over by foreign
agencies. The governorÂ’s office is dominated by USAID, the US Agency for
International Development. The Regional Development Planning Agency has been
taken over by the UN Development Program. And the Australian AIPRD aid
operation is dominating the local district administrations.
In these circumstances, only those who can be described as “good human capital”
can earn a decent income — nobody here has any actual capital.
We have very high unemployment and poverty rates. Official statistics show that
there are almost 900,000 families under the poverty line — 54% of families. The
Bureau of Statistics says that 17% — 417,000 people — are unemployed. And if we
add in underemployment, the figure would go up to 1.3 million people, or 28.2%
of the adult population.
What then is the significance of the victory of candidates associated with GAM
and the referendum movement?
Irwandi Yusuf and Muhammad Nazar won with 39% of the vote. Morever, in seven of
the 19 districts where there were direct elections for district heads.
Candidates associated with GAM also won these. This is indeed very significant.
It is a defeat for the various national, that is, Indonesia-wide, parties and
represents an advance by the Acehnese people. It shows that they no longer have
any trust in the Indonesian political elite and seek an alternative, including
with locally based parties.
But this new Irwandi-Nazar government, while adopting some populist welfare
policies, will compromise with the neoliberal agenda. The national parties will
use any dissatisfaction as momentum against them in the 2009 elections.
It is now much easier for foreign capital to get into Aceh than before when
foreign investors had to deal with a lot of red tape in Jakarta. Even while
Jakarta may see Irwandi-Nazar as anti-national elements, at the same time they
are good agents for neoliberal penetration.
On the other hand, the Irwandi-Nazar victory is a symbol of the victory of the
Acehnese people in defeating the political-military domination of Jakarta.
This reflects the political consciousness of the Acehnese population then?
Yes, but in a way this will not be good for the peoplesÂ’ struggle. They will
continue to be motivated by a chauvinist nationalism which will make Jakarta
the main enemy, while the Irwandi-Nazar government itself will in fact be the
peopleÂ’s enemy in their struggle for greater welfare.
There is still no strong awareness of the role of neoliberalism as a force
hostile to the peopleÂ’s welfare. There is no awareness of the global
imperialist system of exploitation, with Third World countries as the main
object of exploitation. Raising awareness of this and enabling the people to
assess the Irwandi-Nazar government and its program within this framework is a
big task now.
So how do you think the Acehnese political scene will now develop?
There are many initiatives to set up Aceh-based parties, including of course
our own, the PRA. It is GAM that has the best structure and base to set up a
local party, but they are being negatively affected by their own internal
divisions. In the recent elections, most of the GAM elite supported candidates
standing for the United Development Party, a national party. The rest supported
Irwandi and Nazar.
This conflict is now very sharp and beyond reconciliation. The GAM leader,
Malek Mahmud, has announced that there can only be one GAM party and parties
established by other GAM figures will be banned from using GAM symbols. There
may be several such parties.
The pro-referendum movement, organises through Sentral Informasi Referendum
Aceh (SIRA). This is where Nazar comes from. They say they will set up a party
of their own, but this is not certain. SIRA has long hitched itself to GAM.
They will need open support from former GAM figures to be able to go with a
party of their own.
The NGOs, although they campaigned for local parties, are not involved in this
process. Their dependence on foreign funding means they are subject to agendas
that concentrate on post-tsunami rehabilitation projects.
The student movement is also disorganised at the moment and disoriented by the
rise of neoliberalism.
There is a massive ideological battle starting up among Acehnese, but this is
complicated by the arrival of so many foreign social-democratic forces intent
on having an influence and operating through so many of the foreign agencies.
So the Aceh-Jakarta relationship is even more complex now?
The national-based parties were defeated in the elections. This has broken
JakartaÂ’s domination, but in an indirect way. The new government, even with GAM
elements in it, will not reflect the end of such domination if it plays the
role of agents for Jakarta or for imperialist interests.
The growth of foreign domination is now the new trend. The fact that the
central government in Jakarta was unable to end the military conflict and had
to allow a role for foreigners opened the door to them. Then the fact that the
military and political elite in Aceh were unable to act professionally further
expanded that role.
The Body for the Rehabilitation and Reconstruction (BRR) and the Acehnese
government is where they are concentrating their interests. The BRR is no
longer just a reconstruction body but a kind of marketplace where deals and
policy formulation for so many giant projects take place. Many real needs of
the people, such as housing, remain unfulfilled while other big projects get
implemented, but even then, by foreign companies, not by government companies.
The character of this new government is such that it virtually worships the
presence of foreign investors. Its development strategy is not different from
that of the previous government.
It would be a different matter if the government had a more anti-imperialist
character and were to announce, for example, that all Acehnese resources
belonged to the government of Aceh and not foreign companies.
This process has been made possible by the long-term military repression by
Jakarta that has weighed down for so long on the Acehnese people and which has
shaped their political consciousness.
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