Robin McDowell, Banda Aceh – A former rebel leader appeared headed to easy victory Monday in the first elections in Aceh province since the government and the separatists signed a peace deal in the tsunami-ravaged region last year, according to a sampling of votes tallied by two respected local pollsters.
Irwandi Yusuf, who was in jail for treason when the tsunami crashed into the province in 2004, had about 38 percent of the vote for governor, while the second-place candidate had between 15 percent and 17 percent, according to respected local pollsters Jurdil Aceh and the Indonesian Survey Circle.
The statistical surveys of vote returns, known as "quick counts," has a margin of error of 1 to 2 percentage points.
Official results will not be released until Jan. 2, although similar polls accurately forecast the result of national elections in Indonesia in 2004 and in scores of other countries in the world.
If the result is upheld it would represent a stunning victory for the former rebel movement, which formally abandoned its demand for independence and disbanded its armed wing as part of the 2005 peace agreement.
It would also show the level of distrust in Aceh for the central government and the established national political parties, which backed most of the other candidates in the race.
"This is the dream of Acehnese people fulfilled, they want this change," Yusuf told reporters at a four-star hotel that stands out amid the ruins of the tsunami-battered province.
"Aceh in the future will be a wild horse, so many things have to be done," he said, promising to push first for economic development.
The apparent second-place candidate was also backed by the former rebel's exiled political leadership and his running mate was an ex-fighter, further underling popular support in the province for the former insurgents.
"It's a vote for change... Now we're going to have to see how somebody who has been associated with the guerrilla movement actually governs," said Sidney Jones of the International Crisis Group, a Brussels-based research organization.
The 2004 tsunami killed an estimated 167,000 people in Aceh and helped usher an end to the fighting, with both sides saying they did not want to add to the suffering.
The oil-and-gas rich province of 4.3 million people on Sumatra island's northern tip has known almost nothing but war for 130 years, with its residents fighting would-be Dutch colonists, the Japanese and finally Indonesia's central government.
The latest conflict began in 1976 and claimed some 15,000 lives, many of them civilians, and ended with the signing of the peace agreement in Helsinki, Finland, that has exceeded almost everyone's exceptions.
Under the terms of the deal, the military pulled half its 50,000-strong garrison from Aceh and promised the region control over 70 percent of its mineral wealth. It also gave the former rebels the right to take part in politics.
An estimated 85 percent of 2.6 million registered voters were expected to turn out. Those waiting to vote said they hoped more than anything that the winners would make sure guns were permanently silenced.
"It was very difficult before, we could not go anywhere," said Idris Sulaiman, 45, who lives in the village of Naga Umbang, surrounded by brilliant green rice fields and forested hills that used to crawl with rebels, known locally as GAM.
"Soldiers would barge down doors looking for GAM, threatening and beating innocent villagers," he said. "We never want to see anything like that again."
Others said attention needed to go toward fighting corruption, improving education and taking care of tsunami survivors – 70,000 of whom still live in temporary homes, some poorly built, overcrowded and infested with cockroaches.
"Many people need help," said Mailis, 54, who lost her husband, the main breadwinner, to the waves. "They need better homes, jobs," she said while waiting at a booth set up next to temporary barracks for tsunami victims.
The elections marked the first time Acehnese have directly picked their own leaders, though some complained they were turned away because they were not on voter registration lists.
There were no reports of poll violence, but a small bomb went of at a partially built school in northern Aceh at dawn, causing no injuries and little damage, said police, who were investigating.
Earlier, Yusuf, who was a senior member of the rebel's political wing, predicted he would win Monday's vote. "We proved our commitment with lives, blood and tears," he said.