[asia-apec 1296] Re: East Timor - the links between the military and capital

[rc-am]

EAST TIMOR ABRI Inc
By George J. Aditjondro

Sydney Morning Herald
May 8, 1999


THE fighting between the Indonesian-backed pro-integration militias and
supporters of independence in East Timor cannot be understood fully
without taking into account the substantial holdings in the
province of the former Indonesian president Soeharto and his family.
These interests include 564,867 hectares of land. They are holdings that
CNRT, the umbrella organisation of the East Timorese resistance
movement, has made clear it would seize if Timor becomes an independent
state.  The Soeharto landholdings stretch from the western border to the
eastern tip of East Timor and include 50,000 hectares of timber
plantations allocated to Bob Hasan, one of the Soeharto family's
business operators, and tens of thousands of hectares of sugarcan
plantations on the southern coast controlled by Soeharto's children.
The best marble deposits in Timor, at Manatuto, are owned by Siti
Hardiyanti Rukmana, Soeharto's eldest daughter, who also has a monopoly
over coffee production and export from East Timor, through a company of
hers in Dili.  These Soeharto interests are closely intertwined with the
business interests of generals who had served under Soeharto during the
invasion and annexation of East Timor, and other military operations.
Batara Indra, an Indonesian conglomerate backed by retired generals
Benny Moerdani and Dading Kalbuadi, who co-ordinated the operation  that
led to the killings of five Australian-based journalists at Balibo in
1975, controls the sandalwood forests of East Timor and the production
and export of sandalwood oil.  Batara Indra also exports Buddhist
statues to Taiwan and Catholic  statues to Italy, made from East
Timorese sandalwood or marble.  Most of the hotels and the only cinema
in Dili are owned by Batara Indra. The large construction firms in Dili,
involved in all major infrastructure projects - including building the
irrigation canals and ditches for Indonesian "trans- migrants" - either
belong to Moerdani's Batara Indra Group, or to the Anak Liambau Group of
the Jakarta-appointed Governor of East Timor, Jose Abilio Soares.  The
Governor's family is also closely involved with the Soeharto family's
businesses. Gil Alves, a brother-in-law of Governor
Abilio, operates the alcohol sticker monopoly of Soeharto's grandson,
Ari Haryo Wibowo, also known as Ari Sigit.  Alves is also involved in a
drinking water company, Aquamor, and a textile company, PT Dilitex, that
are closely linked with Siti Hedijanti Harijadi, Soeharto's middle
daughter who is married to the sacked General Prabowo Subianto.  Looking
at the leading figures of the pro-integration forces in
East Timor, it is not difficult to find their links to the Soeharto
family or to their own property interests in the province. Top of the
list is Governor Abilio, once a protege of Prabowo when the latter was
still head of the Indonesian Army's special force, Kopassus. Basilio
Araujo, the spokeperson of the pro-integration forces, is also the
deputy head of the provincial investment board, the body that decides
who is allowed to invest in East Timor.  Even the current army commander
of East Timor, Colonel Tono  Suratman, has Soeharto connections. His
family are the co-owners of a pearling company, PT Kima Surya Lestari
Mutiara, with Prabowo's wife. This company has pearl diving operations
offshore from
Flores and Lombok, west of Timor.  Due to its high-level connections,
this Suratman-Prabowo joint venture was allowed to operate within the
boundaries of the Komodo National Park, in Flores, without even paying
any royalties to the Nusa Tenggara Timur province, where the park is
located.  The entire top brass of the Indonesian Army and civilian
bureaucracy in East Timor are closely interlinked with Soeharto's former
inner circle, which has in turn been taken over by his successor, B.J.
Habibie.  Even the Indonesian Armed Forces commander, General Wiranto,
has Soeharto connections, since all the army charities which are now
under his patronage are co-shareholders of many of the Soeharto family's
timber concessions and telecommunication companies. The Soeharto
family's interests in East Timor may be small compared with their
holdings in the rest of Indonesia, but their holdings in East Timor
include the three onshore oil wells that were discovered in the '60s -
the Suai Loro in Covalima, Aliambata in Vikeke, and Pualaca in Manatuto.
And between those three wells lie vast untapped oil
reserves.  The Soeharto family has also made preparations to venture
into the Timor Sea oil reserves. Last year, it set up a new oil company
in Perth, Genindo Western Petroleum Propriety Limited. The company is
headed by Bambang Trihatmodjo, Soeharto's middle son.  Bambang and
younger brother Tommy also own two Singapore-based oil and gas tanker
fleets that operate in the seas between Indonesia and north-east Asia.
No doubt they would be eager to be involved in a similar trade between
the Timor Gap and those same Asian customers.  Bambang is also co-owner
of PT Elnusa, which is involved in building base camps for the oil
companies and related petrochemical industries in Timor.
Tommy, in addition to his tanker fleet, has his own air charter company
which has been waiting to take advantage of the wealth that will flow
from the Timor Gap, where three wells - Elang, Kakatua, and
Kakatua North - have been producing 33,000 barrels of oil per day since
July last year.  And many of the Soeharto clan business partners in
Indonesia's oil and gas fields, such as Mobil Oil, are also active in
the Timor Sea, which could lead them into further joint ventures in this
part of the world.  This is why the Jakarta oligarchy - with the strong
support from their  East Timorese collaborators - are so keen on
undermining a free and fair vote to determine East Timor's future
political status.  Behind the militia tactics in East Timor there is a
strategy to partition East Timor into a western half that supports
continued links with Indonesia and an eastern part that would be allowed
to become independent. Such a partition would roughly follow the lines
of the "oil-rich" and "oil-poor" parts of East Timor.  An alternative
strategy would allow the entire territory to obtain its political
independence, as long as the landholdings of the Soeharto  family and
their East Timorese collaborators were to be respected by an independent
East Timor state, and not be seized by the new government or by the
rightful traditional landowners.

Dr George J. Aditjondro is a lecturer at the Department of Sociology and
Anthropology at the University of Newcastle. His new book, Is Oil
Thicker than Blood? A Study of Oil Companies' Interests and Western
Complicity in Indonesia's Annexation of East Timor will be published by
Nova Science in the US this month.