Rekindling rebellion in Indonesia

A monstrous tsunami doused a decades-long civil war but unyielding economic hardships threaten to create a new generation of rebels.

Supporters of Partai Aceh arrived in Banda Aceh to attend an election campaign on April 1. Aceh rebels and Jakarta reached a peace deal in the aftermath of the devastating 2004 tsunami.

LADONG // Hendra Saputra, 25, sits on a bamboo platform on the shore of this former rebel stronghold, and recalls what motivated him to drop out of high school and spend years in a malarial jungle waging a guerrilla war against the Indonesian army.

"We were fighting for the pride of Aceh," he said, revealing a purplish welt of scar tissue on his arm that resulted from a raid on an army outpost. "We still are. The only difference now is that we no longer fight with the gun." During the conflict, Mr Saputra was a hero in the eyes of the locals fighting for the independence of Aceh, on the northern tip of Indonesia's Sumatra island. Now he is just another jobless ex-combatant.

With only an elementary school education and his longest job experience as a guerrilla, he is unsure of his prospects. He farms chillies on an arid patch next to his wooden hut, making barely enough for his family to live on. Mr Saputra's story encapsulates the dramatic metamorphosis of Aceh's former rebels from gun-brandishing combatants into civilians five years ago. For nearly three decades, a bloody conflict simmered in this oil-and-gas-rich province, driven by the Free Aceh Movement, known by its Indonesian initials, GAM, and claiming the lives of up to 19,000 people. The Indonesian government's sustained military campaign to squelch the armed rebellion and abortive attempts at negotiations failed to bring peace.

It was a natural disaster, the tsunami that struck Aceh's jagged coast on December 26, 2004 which changed everything. It brought death and destruction on a colossal scale - its monstrous waves claimed 176,000 lives and rendered half a million homeless. But it also catalysed peace. GAM, registering that the Aceh people had suffered enough from the tsunami, signed a peace deal, agreeing to abandon its separatist demands in return for greater autonomy and a role in governing the province.

Five years later, there are few signs of conflict. Soldiers, once ubiquitous in Aceh, are a rare sight. Military checkpoints have long evaporated. Streets that went empty at sundown are now swamped with people well after dark. And GAM is no longer a rebel movement, but a recognised political party, known as the Aceh Party. But beneath the veneer of normality, many of the struggles remain which, analysts say, could push Aceh's eggshell-fragile peace agreement to the brink.

At its heart is that the end of conflict did not bring increased economic prosperity for Aceh, leading to widespread disillusionment. Many former combatants have received little of the reintegration funds from local government and international donors, leaving them out of pocket and out of work. Some have turned to gang warfare and extortion, and there have been sporadic incidents of violent crime. According to the World Bank, 44 per cent of countries which see an end to civil war return to conflict within five years.

Its research says that moving the economy, creating jobs - especially for ex-combatants - and rebuilding war-damaged infrastructure is crucial to maintain peace in the aftermath of civil war. Aceh has been swift in refurbishing and building new infrastructure, thanks to the US$8 billion (Dh29.4bn) that flooded into the region through international agencies following the tsunami. But it dwarfs the aid earmarked for post-conflict assistance and reintegration of rebels, about $230 million, even though economic losses due to three decades of conflict - nearly $1.2bn, according to the World Bank - are nearly twice the losses incurred because of the tsunami.

"The government's attitude goes something like this: 'We've given the money; job over'," said a researcher with the World Bank in Banda Aceh, who did not wish to be named. "There is no framework to resolve the conflict." Part of the problem, the researcher said, is that the number of GAM combatants mentioned in the peace accord (3,000) is about eight times lower than the actual number on the ground.

The money is also channelled through GAM commanders so lower-ranking combatants or those with weaker links to commanders have seen little or no money. Mr Saputra received only 13 million rupiah (Dh5,000) of the 25m rupiah promised to each ex-combatant. Many of his former colleagues and families of deceased combatants have not even seen that much. But not all ex-combatants are impoverished and jobless.

Some, especially the senior commanders, have reaped huge economic gains from the reconstruction aid provided by tsunami aid agencies. Until five years ago, Fadhli Abdullah was a battle-hardened rebel commander known for daring guerrilla raids on military outposts. Today, he is a construction contractor who owns a luxury car and a two-storey mansion. "If someone had told me back then that I would be sitting in a five-star hotel smoking a cigar, I would have laughed in his face," he said, lounging on a sofa in a hotel lobby, ignoring a ringing BlackBerry. "But here I am."

But combatants like Mr Abdullah are in the minority. He lays blame for the wide economic chasm between former commanders like him and junior combatants on the central government. The peace accord of 2005 devolved significant political authority and economic resources to Aceh, while ensuring sovereignty remained with the Indonesian state. The central government calls the shots in key policy matters, and nearly 80 per cent of the provincial budget still comes from Jakarta. It refuses to recognise that there are more than 3,000 combatants in urgent need of post-conflict relief, Mr Abdullah said.

Aceh's poverty rate, standing at over 20 per cent, has more than doubled since 1998, making it the only province in Indonesia where poverty rate has continued to surge after 2000. Unemployment stands at 14 per cent, considerably lower than 2006 when 75 per cent of Aceh's population was unemployed. However, more than three-quarters of those are employed in tsunami reconstruction activities, which are unsustainable given tsunami aid money is drying up.

The danger, said the World Bank researcher, is not so much that this will reignite the conflict, but that those who are disillusioned will turn to crime. "It's a ticking time bomb," he said. "One jobless rebel put it to me this way: 'I was better off as a tiger in the jungle than a nobody in the open.'" Already, a group of about 60 rogue ex-combatants in Sawang in southern Aceh, who call themselves Pasuka Petang - or Force of the Sword - are making their presence felt. Last year, Adrian Morel, a French consultant for the World Bank in Indonesia's Aceh province was kidnapped in the region by the group. The rebels asked for a ransom of five billion rupiah. They later released him unharmed after seizing Morel's car and cash, amounting to about $3,300.

"Imagine this: a young, 20-something-old man went to the jungle to fight a long war. A decade later, he emerges. What skill does he have other than knowing how to shoot people?" said Nur Djuli, a former GAM negotiator and chairman of the Aceh Reintegration Agency. "In 10-12 years, if the peace accord is not implemented, the next generation will rise in rebellion," he said. * The National