Jakarta – The challenge of staging polls in Indonesia's Aceh this year should not derail a peace pact signed in 2005 between separatists and the government, an analyst said Thursday.
The province is set to hold its first-ever gubernatorial elections on December 11 under the pact, which was signed last August by Jakarta and the rebel Free Aceh Movement (GAM). The agreement ended nearly three decades of conflict.
Voters will also select the heads of Aceh's 19 districts and mayoralty. "At this point of time, I don't think there is anything significant enough (related to the polls) to derail the peace process," said Sidney Jones, the Southeast Asian director of the International Crisis Group, a Brussels-based think-tank.
She told a public discussion about the polls that one of the main reasons why was that only individuals could run and not political parties, which under the peace deal will have to wait until the next electoral cycle begins in 2009.
Local political parties are outlawed elsewhere in Indonesia, but are to be permitted in Aceh under the deal.
"The safety valve that is built in is the notion that it is actually the 2009 elections that are really important for GAM," Jones said.
"There will be irritation, disappointment, frustration, resentment, all of the above, if they come out with nothing from the local elections, but because of the higher goal of 2009, it may not have a particularly destabilizing effect," she said.
Jones also noted that GAM had now split into two rival groups mostly due to differences over who to nominate as a candidate for governor. One centered around ex-leaders who were exiled in Sweden and the other around leaders here.
Their rivalry – which was "getting really, really down and dirty now" with both sides trading insults and accusations – reduced the prospect of violence, she said.
Other elements, such as the Indonesian security authorities, would have more scope to throw money and support behind one candidate and spread disinformation on others than to engage in open violence, Jones added.
The peace pact was spurred by the 2004 Asian tsunami, which killed some 168,000 people in Aceh. GAM agreed to drop its demand for independence in return for partial self-rule.
Aceh, located at the northernmost tip of Sumatra island, was racked by a violent separatist conflict for 29 years that claimed the lives of some 15,000 people, mostly civilians.