The Moluccas...
...from harmony to sectarian violence

Yulius Setiarto writes
about the igniting of
religious violence in the
Indonesian Spice islands,
where Christians and
Moslems once let each
other live in peace.

On Christmas day, members of the Moslem community in the Moluccas used to celebrate with their Christian neighbours. They would embrace and shake hands, and cook special food for the occasion, just as Christians would do to mark Lebaran, a Moslem feast. Moslems and Christians had relatives of the other faith and thought nothing of it. Until 19 January 1999, which should become a national day of mourning for the people in the Moluccas, when a seemingly trivial fight between a Christian driver and a Moslem gang member exploded into sectarian conflict which has raged since. The violence, which has torn the Indonesian Spice Islands apart and resulted in widespread death and displacement, escalated sharply in early May this year with the arrival of thousands of Laskar Jihad troops from Java. The Jihad have reportedly launched several unprovoked and savage attacks on Christian communities, particularly in the north of Halmahera island, slaughtering several villagers, including women and children.

The harmony in which the Christian and Moslem communities of the Moluccas previously lived is in such sharp contrast to the present nightmare of violence that many hold that the fighting did not just happen, but was engineered. Different parties to the conflict claimed that events were pushed by an ‘invisible powerful force’, which was motivated by definite goals in Jakarta. Few doubt that elements of Indonesia's political and military circles are at least tacitly fuelling the conflict. The reasons why are the subject of theory: one goal often mentioned is the undermining of President Wahid's government. Events seem to bear out speculation. Christians have accused security forces of doing nothing to stop the onslaught of the well-organised and well-funded Jihad fighters, while in other instances, members of the Indonesian military allegedly handed out weapons, even to children, encouraging them to fight.

Whatever the motivation underlying the conflict in the Moluccas, its results are only too tragically clear as hundreds of thousands of people have been forcibly displaced. Internally displaced people have sought refuge in churches, mosques, schools, public buildings, government offices, and some in camps. An estimated 3,000 people have died since fighting broke out and hundreds of buildings have been burnt to the ground.

The social and cultural foundations of life in the Moluccas have been ripped apart. Adults have lost their jobs, children have lost their time to play and their opportunities for education. Worse, they have lost their childhood as they face killing, rape and destruction. The seeds of resentment have been sown in their hearts, seeds which threaten tomorrow's generation of Moluccans. People of different faiths now regard each other with deep hostility. Ambon, the provincial capital, has been rigidly divided along Christian and Moslem lines, even the shelters for those who are displaced, which few dare to cross.

After a JRS worker from Jakarta visited the Moluccas regularly over several months, JRS set up a team in Ambon in March, only to evacuate in late June as violence escalated and a declared state of civil emergency made it impossible to function. The future of JRS in Ambon will be re-evaluated according to the security situation in the islands. We are keeping in touch with what is going on, especially in Ambon, getting news from friends who are still there.

We left on 28 June. On the day before I left, I evacuated a Moslem friend of mine, because he was accused of being a spy and a traitor by many Moslem people in Batu Merah. I was very sad when I met him at the border between Mardika and Batu Merah. It is so hard now to meet a friend who is of a different religion in Ambon.

Perhaps the greatest need for a people torn apart by the exploitation of religious differences is reconciliation. JRS aimed to do just that, with a team of both Moslems and Christians to have access to all the camps and to be an active witness to reconciliation. When JRS set up in Ambon, we rented a small house located near the border dividing the Moslem and Christian areas with the intention of being accessible to displaced people of both religions. The team divided into groups, serving in different camps. Two of us, Marlon and Risvi, served in Halong and Arema. To reach these camps, they had to travel by speedboat every day as it was too risky to travel by road.

JRS visited camps in Ambon island and other islands like Ceram and Buru, just to see how the displaced people lived in the camps, to hear their stories, and to understand their hope. We did not embark on a specific project for a while but just visited the people, prayed with them, and played with the many children in the camps. This was not easy to do because the displaced people equated the arrival of volunteers with the distribution of material assistance or the collection of data. However, we felt well accepted by the people and came to be real companions to them.

The projects JRS eventually took up focused mainly on education and health as both the public health care network and the government education program had collapsed in Ambon. Before evacuating, mobile health care services were set up in close collaboration with the local Hative hospital. The hospital gave nurses and transport while we provided medicines and volunteers. JRS also worked with the Piru district medical public centre in West Ceram to make health care available to Moslem and Christian villages in the area.

We started some income-generating projects in the camps as a way of offering the displaced people an alternative to an unhealthy dependency on NGO aid. It meant giving them the will to survive. Many internally displaced people had lost their jobs, dependent for their survival on handouts from NGOs, so we explored with them the possibility of undertaking some work. Most of our efforts focused on agriculture, and the plan was to lend money without interest to enable the displaced people to set up means of production. However, our evacuation stalled this.

As the situation in Ambon became more insecure, emergency action formed an ever greater part of our work. On several occasions, JRS found safer places of refuge for displaced people living in camps when incidents flared up and they had to leave. We also evacuated our volunteer friends who felt their lives were in danger.

There were and are many ways to help the people in the Moluccas. For JRS, every step, every action taken, rested on one principle: “Just to return to human truth itself, in place from the beginning.” In the Moluccas, a return to truth may be the realisation that having different religious beliefs from someone else need not mean they are your enemies and that, whatever has happened, you are not justified in inhumane treatment of them.

Servir Magazine No. 20 / July 2000
www.jesref.org