By Sam King
JAKARTA Suharto's fall and the mass movement that overthrew him have inspired a massive increase in the struggle for democracy in Indonesia's "autonomous province" of Aceh. On November 4, more than 30,000 people demonstrated in Aceh for a referendum on independence.
Taking advantage of the new political space there has been a boom in the number of human rights and non-government organisations established. There has been a rapid development of the student organisations campaigning for democracy and a referendum, which are organising mass mobilisations against military oppression and the Indonesian government. And there has been a revival of the Free Aceh Movement (GAM), an Islamic pro-independence organisation formed in 1976 whose armed wing has been conducting guerilla struggle against the Indonesian military since the mid-1970s, but was relatively weak before Suharto's fall.
The Acehnese have a long history of struggle against exploitation and foreign control. Attempts by Dutch colonialists to monopolise the economy provoked fierce resistance as, despite many feudal rulers conceding to the Dutch, the Acehnese people refused to accept their status as a colonial possession.
History of resistance Aceh was the last part of the Dutch East Indies, now Indonesia, to be conquered by the Dutch army. It was also one of the bastions of Indonesia's national independence struggle, which was victorious in 1949.
A movement for independence under the banner of Darul Islam, which sought to form an Islamic state, resulted in 1959 in autonomy being granted to Aceh. This gave Aceh formal control of religion, customary law and education in the region.
However, this autonomy became meaningless after Suharto took power in 1965. Acehnese were not exempt from the new military regime's mass slaughter of "communist" civilians throughout Indonesia in 1965-66. With the centralisation of power under Suharto in the late 1960s and early '70s, the formal rights handed to Aceh ceased to exist in reality and exploitation of the region increased.
GAM was formed in 1976, led by Hasan di Tiro. It declared independence from the Republic of Indonesia and began guerilla warfare against Suharto's forces. GAM's low-intensity activities throughout the 1980s were supported by a section of the population in Aceh.
In 1989, popular support for GAM increased and it revived its armed struggle. This lasted until the early 1990s. In mid-1991, Major-General Pramono lamented that the guerrillas were "everywhere among the people" and "had a concept, had guns and on the ground had the masses".
The army also worried that GAM was supported by the educated elite; some academics were tried for supporting the armed struggle and given particularly harsh sentences. In 1991, Aceh was declared a "military operation zone", which allowed the deployment of special forces there.
The violence and terror carried out by Indonesian forces against Aceh's people lasted from 1989 until the overthrow of Suharto. Since then it has declined somewhat. Torture, rape, mass arrests, extra-judiciary killing and massacres were used to crush the GAM by the early 1990s. The number of GAM troops declined and many of the leaders fled across the border to Malaysia.
The regime's campaign of mass violence and terror has only now been reduced by the renewed struggle of the Acehnese. The revival of the movement is concentrated in student organisations across Aceh. The largest of these is the Student Solidarity for Reform (SMUR). A dozen other groups now exist, part of the heightened organisation of students across Indonesia.
SMUR's original political goal, one which was shared by the student movement across Indonesia, was to overthrow the Suharto dictatorship. SMUR did not initially campaign for independence or for a referendum on Aceh's status.
However, after Suharto's overthrow, the military increased its repression in Aceh. Political space had opened up for activists in the capital, but massacres continued in many of the provinces. The regime claimed that the military offensives were "clashes with GAM" and that GAM had carried out the massacres of the population.
However, a 1998 parliamentary fact-finding mission excavated mass graves and uncovered proof that the killings were carried out by the military. This forced the government to officially revoke Aceh's status as a Territory of Military Operation.
Referendum on independence The discovery of the mass graves and the ongoing military repression in Aceh have popularised the idea of independence. The exact extent of support for independence is unclear, but it is clear that the majority of people in Aceh acknowledge GAM as the main opposition to the hated Indonesian armed forces. GAM leaders, along with many refugees, have returned from Malaysia and GAM's military strength is now considerable.
The new political forces the student organisations are focused overwhelmingly on two main issues: ending military violence and for a referendum on independence, which they argue is the most democratic way to decide Aceh's status. They also call for dialogue between the Indonesian government and all the political forces in Aceh.
President Abdurrahman Wahid was reported in the Indonesian media on November 2 as stating that he would scrap the plan to establish a local military command structure in Aceh. Originally, local command was to replace the forces the government claims to have withdrawn when Aceh's military operation zone status was cancelled in 1998. But the plan provoked mass protests in Aceh, was rejected by students in other parts of Indonesia and was condemned by Indonesian and international human rights groups.
Pressure from within Indonesia on the government to end the human rights abuses in Aceh is much greater than it was regarding East Timor. Most Indonesians know very little about East Timor, but Aceh's long history as part of Indonesia has generated much sympathy among Indonesians for the Acehnese people's struggle. This was solidified by the wide media coverage of the parliamentary fact-finding mission's discoveries.
Democracy activists hope to use this public support to force the new government to meet the demands of Aceh's mass movement: to withdraw the military and hold a referendum on Aceh's status.