Washington Report on Middle East Affairs, March 2007, pages 38, 51

Islam and the Near East in the Far East

From Prison to Regional Government for Aceh’s Former Rebels

By John Gee

EX-GUERRILLA fighters took a majority of the votes in Aceh’s Dec. 11, 2006 elections. Irwandi Yusuf, a former spokesperson for the Free Aceh Movement (GAM), topped the poll for governorship of the northern Indonesian province with 38 percent of the vote. He was followed by Humam Hamid, with 16 percent; Humam’s running mate as vice governor was former university lecturer Hasbi Abdullah, younger brother of GAM’s foreign minister. Eight pairs of candidates (for governor and deputy) ran in the election.

Former rebels also performed well in contests for mayor and district head in different localities in Aceh, taking most of the available positions. This augurs well for their prospects in Indonesia’s 2009 legislative elections, which are likely to be fiercely contested.

The elections consolidate the peace agreement (unambitiously signed as a Memorandum of Understanding) reached between GAM and the government of Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono and GAM on Aug. 15, 2005. It was originally envisaged that they would take place in April 2006, but that was dependent upon the cooperation of Indonesia’s parliament. The president was confident he could gain its support, but the process was more protracted than anticipated. There is a genuine anxiety among many Indonesians that the concession of any special rights or status to a region could eventually lead to its secession and the break-up of their country. They cite the example of East Timor, which claimed its independence after being allowed to vote on its future in 1999. This despite the fact that East Timorese never accepted their incorporation into Indonesia, nor did the United Nations. Indonesian thinking on this question remains out of step with the rest of the world’s to this day.

Resistance to implementation of the peace agreement was particularly strong among parliament’s more nationalistic political forces, including the PDI-P, the party of former President Megawati Sukarnoputri.

Eventually, however, by patiently building support in parliament and making some concessions to the agreement’s critics, the government won the backing it needed to pass the Law on the Governance of Aceh. It was helped by the restraint shown by former GAM leaders, who certainly had cause to complain that the terms upon which they had agreed to give up their arms and relinquish the goal of secession were being modified. The outcome was a law that gave less authority than originally anticipated to the Acehnese local government.

A particular point of contention was the participation of former GAM leaders in political life. Indonesian law requires parties that stand for office to put up candidates in a number of provinces, not just one: this is intended to prevent any organization promoting the secession of a region from gaining a foothold in government at any level. Allowing former GAM members to participate in political life was an essential element of the August 2005 peace settlement, but as their political goals and histories were unlikely to appeal to voters outside Aceh, it was necessary to find a way to permit them to stand for office without fulfilling the condition of contesting elections elsewhere in Indonesia. A solution was found in agreeing that they could run for office as independents.

The former rebels took part in the elections on this basis, and did not use it as a tactical cover for running a GAM slate. Some ran against each other, and some allied with Indonesian parties.

The victorious gubernatorial candidate, Irwandi Yusuf, was a guerrilla fighter in GAM. Captured by the Indonesian army, he escaped from his prison when it was wrecked during the Dec. 26, 2004 tsunami. He later joined the peace talks in Helsinki that produced the Memorandum of Understanding.

Irwandi Yusuf’s vice-governor will be Muhammad Nazar, a skilled political organizer. After the downfall of the Suharto regime, Nazar emerged as leader of the umbrella group of Acehnese organizations campaigning for a referendum to decide Aceh’s future. One rally achieved a turnout of over a million people in Bandar Aceh, the region’s capital. Nazar was imprisoned for his activities, but was released along with most other Acehnese political prisoners and GAM fighters following the signing of the August 2005 agreement.

The successes of the former rebels should bring dedicated and reform-minded activists into leading positions at a time when they are desperately needed by a territory trying desperately to overcome the legacy of war and the 2004 tsunami. Indonesia as a whole will be watching closely how they perform. If they are seen to be showing a genuine commitment to change within the context of a unified Indonesian republic, that is likely to have an impact upon how any future moves to decentralize authority are received.

John Gee is a free-lance journalist based in Southeast Asia, and the author of Unequal Enemies: The Palestinians and Israel, available from the AET Book Club.

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