ABC, 06/02/2002 13:57:51
MALUKU: Ambon "a tropical Beirut"
One of the legacies of Dutch colonial rule in Indonesia is that the Netherlands has a
significant population of people who originally hail from Maluku, the troubled region of
Eastern Indonesia, formerly known as the Spice Islands. Many people from Maluku
migrated to the Netherlands in the 1950s, most were Christians and most were the
families of soldiers in the Dutch colonial army. The community has taken a close
interest in the violence between Christians and Muslims that has plagued Maluku in
recent years. One such person, the director of the Maluku Historical Museum in the
Netherlands, has just visited Ambon, which he describes as a tropical Beirut.
Transcript:
MANUHUTU: "The situation seemingly was better then when I visit one year ago. At
that time there were still shootings, bombings, all the time, but people assured me
that the unrest was relative, there was incidental shooting and just on the day that I
left for this conference somebody was shot.
"And so while the level of violence varies people are still living in a state of fear one
could say, still confined to their own community. Because if you go to Ambon it's a
separated city, it's a sort of tropical Beirut.
"Coming from the airport if you're a Muslim you go by land and if you're a Christian you
go by boat in order to reach the city, and you have all these separate neighbourhoods
where people stay with their fellow co-religionists.
"And well by and large it's a sad sight, there's still a lot of signs of destruction and of
even though some of the places are being rebuilt and for instance there is an
alternative campus of the university that was burned down in July 2000 that is being
rebuilt, still you see a lot of signs of destruction."
MARES: Is there any interaction between the Muslim and the Christian communities
or is it a near total divide?
MANUHUTU: "It's near total divide.
"There are several places where people interact, there are small near hotels and in
front of the army hospital in the city there is some economic activity going on. Muslim
fishermen selling their fish to Christian customers and students intermingling at the
alternative campus, people meeting each other and the governors office, but it's very
limited, by and large people do not visit one another because they're afraid for their
lives. If they have contact they do it by telephone."
MARES: What about the role of outside groups such as the militia group Laskar
Jihad, is the Laskar Jihad still active in Maluku?
MANUHUTU: "It's still active, still present and it still plays an important role. It has
come to the Malukus to defend as in its own words the Muslims that were being
slaughtered by the Christians.
"And up until this day it still legitimises its presence by pointing to Christians and
saying that Christians actually want to secede from Indonesia and in order to prevent
that separatist movement by the Christians they have to stay in the Malukus.
"And by staying in the Malukus they are a continuous source of unrest and a
continuous source of conflict also because the Christians demand that the Laskar
Jihad be removed from the Malukus before they want to really talk about well
reconciliation I guess."
MARES: As you say the Laskar Jihad accuses Christian groups of supporting
separatism, and of course there is a history of a separatist movement, the so called
RMS or "Republik Maluku Selatan" or the "Republic of the South Malukus". Is that a
real force these days?
MANUHUTU: "To the best of my knowledge no.
"There are small groups that are saying that if we look at the present day situation the
Indonesian government does nothing for us so we are better off establishing a
separate state. There are these groups but by and large they constitute a small
minority.
"The majority of the Christian population is disappointed by the fact that the
government has not been able or not been willing to put an end to the conflict over
the last three years but by and large does not have very strong separatist sentiments.
But that might grow in the future if the government remains one could say impotent to
solve the problem."
MARES: And what role are the security forces playing in Maluku now? Are they
monitoring? Are they playing an honest broker type role in keeping the two
communities apart?
MANUHUTU: "If we look at the conflict and if you talk to people right now they say
well you have to look which units are stationed in a specific area.
"There are units that are being trusted, and there are other units that people see as
being directly involved in the fighting. And what has happened in the last couple of
months that there were several incidents involving different army units who clashed
with each other, who shot at each other, police with army, marines and police.
"So of course when that happens the trust of the people in the security forces only
diminishes as people say well if the police and the military are shooting each other
what are we to do?"
MARES: There are efforts afoot to try and promote reconciliation between Muslims
and Christians in Maluku. Do you see those efforts making any progress?
MANUHUTU: "There are efforts making progress slowly, and of course whenever
there are attempts or plans to have people sit together or work together there are
always threats.
"The common markets are under threat, sometimes bombs explode or people are
being shot, but by and large the people in the Malukus say better to do it on a day to
day basis on a very concrete basis, if we have these officials coming talking about
reconciliation chances are that after they're gone the results are gone also.
"So better to leave it to the ordinary people because it is the firm belief of many
people that the vast majority of both the Christian and the Muslim community is totally
fed up with this situation and wants peace but because there are groups that are still,
that have an interest in continuing the violence and because of the lack of one could
say firm action by the government, these groups still have the opportunity to play their
role."
MARES: And is there a role for other countries to play, for an international role to play
in Maluku?
MANUHUTU: "At this time there is a large international presence in the humanitarian
field, there are a lot of international humanitarian agencies such as the UNDP,
UNICEF and other agencies who are working in the Malukus right now.
"So by being there they constitute one could say the ears and eyes of the
international community.
"Besides that I do believe that the international community has to remind,
continuously remind the Indonesian government of its obligation when it says that the
Maluku conflict and the other conflicts in Indonesia are internal affairs, it's under the
obligation to seriously deal with those conflicts.
"And what we have seen during the past three years is that well there can be very
serious doubts on the willingness of the central government to really deal with the
Maluku conflict. So in that respect I do believe that the international community has a
role to play."
MARES: On the other hand if a country like Australia or the Netherlands criticises the
Indonesian government and says you should be doing more in Maluku, this is often
used by hardline Islamic groups or by conservative nationalist elements in the armed
forces to say look there's a western-Christian conspiracy to break up Indonesia,
they're meddling again in our affairs.
MANUHUTU: "That is true and it's a very thin line that you have to tow and therefore
it's very important that and serious attempts are being made right now by western
governments not to come out in favour of the Christians alone, but come out in favour
of the victims of the violence, not only in the Malukus, not only Christians and
Muslims in the Malukus but also in Aceh where the majority of the victims are
Muslim, so as to prevent the image of the Christian West helping out its old allies to
being exploited Indonesia.
"To a certain extent that's indefatigable, people will use that, but you can do your best
to make it as hard as possible for those people to do so."
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06/02/2002 13:57:51 | Asia Pacific Programs
© 2001 Australian Broadcasting Corporation
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