Playing Political Football with Moluccan Lives 

By Dr. George J. Aditjondro

Asia Pacific Network | 19 July 2000

Thousands of people have died in the Moluccas (Maluku), the popularly known Spice Islands north of Australia, in what seems to be a religious war between Christians and Muslims. Official estimates have put the death toll at 3,000. However, Rev. John Barr from the Uniting Church of Australia has put the death toll at around 10,000, which has been confirmed by my sources in Maluku and Australia. This includes the nearly 500 refugees whose boat capsized in the stormy waters between North Maluku and North Sulawesi, last month.
 
Unfortunately, this tragedy has not attracted much concern in Australia, despite the fact that Maluku had played a role similar to East Timor during the Second World War. Over 1,100 Australian troops had been sent to Ambon, the provincial capital, to protect Australia from the Japanese invasion. Despite the support from Ambonese soldiers in the Dutch colonial army, this Gull Force was no match for the invading Japanese troops. The Australian war cemetery in the city of Ambon, near the Pattimura University, is a silent testimony to their sacrifices of hundreds of Australians diggers that were killed in battle over Ambon. 

The Pattimura University itself, however, has recently been burned to ground by a new invasion, namely the invasion of 10,000 Jihad (Holy War) fighters who sailed to Maluku with the tacit support from Brawijaya commander Mayor General Sudi Silalahi and East Java Police Commander Mayor General Da'i Bachtiar, who seem to be still loyal to the disposed General Wiranto, supposedly to 'liberate' their Moluccan brothers and sisters from 'religious cleansing' by Christian Moluccans. 

​Despite the state of 'civilian emergency' decreed by President Wahid, killings have still continued. Therefore, it is important to dissect the forces that are behind the violence and explore ways for the Indonesian government and it's friendly neighbours to assist the remaining Moluccans from further extermination.  

​As has been the case in the post-referendum violence in East Timor, the inter-religious riots in Maluku which erupted in January 1999 was well-planned and prepared by officers and politicians loyal to Suharto with initially two goals.
  
First, to destablise one of the strongholds of Megawati Sukarnoputri, who was then the strongest presidential candidate to replace Suharto's hand-picked successor, B.J. Habibie.  
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Secondly, to create unrest in places where then armed forces commander General Wiranto wanted to revive army divisions (KODAM) abolished by his predecessor, General Benny Murdani. 

Indeed, four months after the inter-religious violence began in Ambon, the old Pattimura Command was revived, covering the entire Maluku archipelago. Similar attempts to recreate the old Kodams in Kupang, Pontianak, and Padang have not been that successful.While the violence in Ambon and the nearby islands continued, with more troops flown in from Java and South Sulawesi, the old Maluku province was soon divided into the pre-dominantly Muslim province of North Maluku with its capital in Ternate and the religiously balanced province of Maluku, with Ambon as its capital. 

​After initially using Ambonese gangsters as a smokescreen, paramilitary forces close to Suharto and troops loyal to Wiranto maintained the momentum of killings and destruction by continuously creating casualties on both sides that cried for revenge. 

Exhausted and saddened by the killings, Christian and Muslim leaders in Ambon repeatedly tried to make peace between the two groups. Repeatedly, however, two intelligence officers in the Pattimura Command, Colonel Budiatmo and Colonel Nono, made sure that peace could not be restored. Budiatmo maintains links with the Christian militia in Ambon under the command of Agus Wattimena, while Nono maintains links with the Muslim militias, who are currently strengthened by the Jihad fighters from Java and South Sulawesi. Nono's younger brother, Nono Sampurno is ironically, a Navy colonel who serves as an adjudant to Vice President Megawati Sukarnoputri. 

When Mayor General Max Tamaela, the Christian Ambonese Pattimura commander was recently replaced by Colonel I Made Yasa, a Hindu-Balinese officer, those two intelligence officers were kept in their place by the powers that be in Jakarta. In fact, they probably know Maluku better than the new Pattimura commander, since they have already been stationed in Ambon before the Pattimura Command was revived, under Suaidy Marasabessy, a Muslim Ambonese officer close to Wiranto. 

​Currently, two other interest groups are involved in maintaining the violence in Maluku. The first group are radical Muslims who oppose Wahid's presidency and are financially backed by Dr Fuad Bawazier, a former Finance Minister under Suharto who is currently close to Wahid's main nemesis, parliament speaker Amien Rais. The second group consists of Indonesian business conglomerates who benefit from the troubles in Maluku to escape from their obligation to pay trillions of rupiahs debt to the Indonesian banks. 

The first group had sent the Jihad fighters to Maluku. The bulk of these fighters are actually naïve villagers who believe in the existence of an international Christian plot to dismantle the Indonesian Republic which in their eyes,   

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