Rogindon:
Yes, I do support the East Timor elected Government which Fretilin won with an overwhelming majority in a U.N. Supervised election. They are not arrogant Portuguese but native born East Timorese with some Portuguese heritage some of whom formed an external mission that maintained headquarters due to the courtesy of the Mozambique Government during the occupation of their country by Indonesia whilst they worked to convince the world that the people wanted Independence (which they voted for under duress from the TNI.)

I was present in Dili on the first anniversary of the founding of Fretilin on the 20th May 1975 and recognised then that the Maubere people overwhelmingly supported Fretilin and their policies although it was obvious that the Portuguese elites who formed the UDT did not support them.

I continued to support them through the UDT inspired Coup attempt in August 1975 and through the Indonesian invasion and 24 years of vicious Indonesian repression.

The elected members of Fretilin who are managing the Country are determined to develop their country wisely and prudently without becoming prisoners of the IMF and the World Bank.

Now that earnings from Timor shelf oil and gas provides about a 15 fold increase in their budget the future will show a steady, sustainable improvement in the lives of the people who presently enjoy life as subsistence farmers.

The East Timorese are experiencing problems and will work through them in the forthcoming Conference of Fretilin in open discussion.
The next election will show the extent to which they continue to enjoy the confidence of the people which is a damn site more that the West Papuans have under arrogant Indonesian rule.

Ningtyas

Ok, this is good, you have clarified one thing – you are on a very different wavelength to PTBI.

I am sorry that I have confused some of his comments with yours. I am pleased that you take a much more sensible stance.

It seems that we do indeed share a lot of common ground. But we still have differences;

" ‘Demanding Indonesia to give Papua referendum is like demanding Australia to give Aborigines the right to choose between continueing under white rules or be the master of their own land (means white must be out).’ Which means; unrealistic and impossible.”

Not so. There are huge differences.

While I think that the displacement of Aborigines in Australia is, as I said last time, atrocious, it is indeed far too far past that phase in history to reverse it. If the land was to be handed back to Aborigines, non-indigenous Australians most of whom were born here, many of multiple-generations in this land, would be forced to abandon the continent, if any other country or countries would take us, or perhaps be given space in some small corner of the continent. The country would for all intents and purposes cease to exist. Then there are heaps of other issues. Of course, the concept is ludicrous.

However in Papua the repatriation of Javanese and other transmigrants and the relocation of the rest to other parts of Indonesia would not be all that difficult, if it came to the crunch. The integrity of Indonesia would not be threatened. Who is to say that they would all have to go anyway if Papua did vote for self-rule? It is thus a totally different situation.

What do you have to say about my assertion that the 1969 referendum was a total sham, bearing in mind that the blame has to be shared between Indonesia, the US and the UN? Can you assert that it was fair and proper? If not, why shouldn’t it be reheld?

A referendum for Aborigines to decide on whether whites stay or leave would be very interesting.
By 'aboriginals' do you mean full bloods only or all the mixtures as well?
Who could guarentee that this country would not be taken over by a less humane people as the last white marched out. You?
How would you classify the mixtures , the half bloods, the quarter bloods, the one little drop of blood?
Who has the vote and who hasn't.
Silly statements get silly responses.

Ludwig / Ningtyas,
Isn't it interesting how the Indonesians always shoot themselves in the foot? If they had said nothing about the 42 refugees, the overwhelming majority of Australians would neither know nor care about West Papua. The Indonesians themselves have made West Papua an issue through their pompous blustering over this issue. There is an interesting comparison with China which said little after we granted the dissident diplomat Chen asylum so the way China treats pro-democracy activists has not become a big issue.

Maracas,
I lived in East Timor for 18 months and my opinion based on living there was that the Fretilin government was arrogant and out of touch. Also it is important not to throw the baby out with the bath water. Indonesia brought some good things especially with regard to education and infrastructure. Fretilin seem to be governing for the 10% who speak Portuguese rather than the 90% who speak Indonesian (albeit as a second or third language). Maputo isn't necessarily any better than Denpasar or Jakarta as a place to learn good governance and democracy.

Do you think Mari Alkatiri will get rolled next week? I understand the petitioners lying in wait in Ermera also want him out and they are armed.

Rogindon
Mari could get rolled as there has been a hate campaign going on for some time that has been fuelled by sectarian elements who have spread unfounded rumours of corruption about him, also because he is a moslem.I have known him and many others in the Government for more than 25 years. I am impressed with their governance in an extremely difficult financial environment.

He has been a tenacious and effective negotiator over the timor gap issue and his refusal to embrace foreign investment,and preference for slow sustainable development has made him appear arrogant to those who want to cash in on foreign dollars.

It will be debated next week in open debate as it should be and I believe it will come down to the delegates to decide.
He will abide by the decisions of Conference, which I hope are made on facts and not innuendo and rumours.

If the petitioners at Ermera cross the line and decide to use mob violence, they will pay a high price. I think the Government has exercised considerable restraint in dealing with the demonstrations unlike the Indonesians in West Papua

Ningtyas

Another interesting point from my confusion of your comments with some of those of PTBI, where I incorrectly attributed some very strong views to you:

It is all too easy to do this sort of thing and it gets done far too often. In fact I reckon it is one of the most dangerous aspects to all sorts of debates – the tendency to misinterpret or misattribute views, or to gloss over views that are moderate and remember only those that are towards the end of the spectrum, and then either deliberately or unconsciously make these out to be the prevailing view.

A couple of posters on this thread seem to be so fundamentally polarised that nothing can get them to see things in a balanced manner. They are just the sort of people that have a tendency to deliberately beat up the views of those with whom they disagree, or even lie straight-faced at times.

Ningtyas, even though it didn’t seem so at first, I think you have demonstrated that you can see and well-appreciate the need to strive for a realistic perspective. But just the opposite is apparent with PTBI.

It is a constant struggle. But if we were all to do it, I think that except for one or two lesser beings we would realise that we have a lot of common ground and that the opposing views, when expressed in a moderate manner, are not that outrageous and can be meaningfully debated, instead of the same absurdities being repeated over and over again.

End of conflict-resolution psychoanalysis psychobabble :>)