Indonesia's urge to break apart

If people here are wary of the Army, they have a reason to be. In Irian Jaya, Indonesia's easternmost province, thousands have died during three decades of a small but persistent antigovernment guerrilla war.

So when Army troops last week chased away the pedicab drivers and took up positions, a tremor moved across Wamena's marketplace.

But on this day, much to the amusement of the salespeople and their customers, the soldiers set to work with brooms and shovels, cleaning up the market.

This public relations effort has so far been the military's only answer to the challenge put to them by Irian Jaya, the western half of the huge island of New Guinea. Delegates to a dialogue earlier this year surprised President B.J. Habibie by demanding independence and threatening to boycott upcoming elections if he failed to agree by April 1.

And the people here know the soldiers could shoot again.

Last year, dozens of Papuans were killed in several towns after they raised the West Papua flag in place of the Indonesian red-and-white flag. Many are still in jail on sedition charges that could carry the death penalty.

But Mr. Habibie and his military commander, General Wiranto, have so far been careful not to spark another spate of violence in a country already torn by communal fighting.

Deep-seated resentment

The clean up in the Wamena bazzar also shows, however, that Indonesia's government hasn't grasped that it will take more than a broom to sweep away the resentment it created with its military brutality, heavily centralized rule, and exploitation of natural resources that left little wealth for the local population.

The Papua people, who are mostly Christian and ethnically distinct from the Muslim Malays who dominate in Indonesia, feel particularly discriminated against. In Wamena, for instance, ethnic Malays and Chinese run the shops, hotels, market, and the taxis. This has left hundreds of young Irian Jayans, educated in Indonesian schools and no longer content to stay on the farm, unemployed and frustrated.

"We got poor and they got rich," is the simple summary of Tom Beanal, a tribal leader who gained fame for lobbying against Freeport McMoRan, a controversial mining company from New Orleans that exploits the giant Grasberg gold and copper mine. "We were never happy inside Indonesia," Mr. Beanal adds.

Across the archipelago, ethnic groups are raising demands for more autonomy for their provinces or even secession. Failure to respond quickly and adequately to such challenges could cost Jakarta control over much of Indonesia's territory, leading to a breakup much like that of the Soviet Union or Yugoslavia.

So far Habibie has only inspired more calls for secession by offering to grant independence to East Timor, although he has tried to treat that province as a separate case since it has been occupied only since 1975 and never belonged to the Dutch colony that became Indonesia. Last week the president visited Aceh, an oil-rich province, to apologize for human rights abuses by the military and mitigate demands for independence. But his visit only rallied protesters.

Page: 1 | 2