Christine T. Tjandraningsih, Jakarta – A former rebel negotiator won a landmark gubernatorial election in Indonesia's once-restive Aceh Province, the region's electoral commission announced Friday.
The Aceh Independent Election Commission said Irwandi Yusuf of the now-defunct separatist Free Aceh Movement, better known by its acronym GAM, and running mate former student activist Muhammad Nazar grabbed 38.20 percent of the vote in Indonesia's northernmost province. They ran as independents in the election.
Yusuf's leading vote tally was followed by that of university professor Humam Hamid, a GAM sympathizer, who was nominated by the Muslim-based United development Party, one of the country's major political parties. The official results showed the professor and running mate Hasbi Abdullah got 16.62 percent of the vote.
"Whoever the winner, it is the choice of the Acehnese people, so we must respect it," presidential spokesman Andi Mallarangeng told Kyodo News in a response to Yusuf's victory. "Let's build a new history in Aceh."
From the House of Representatives, which earlier expressed concern over the imminent victory of a GAM gubernatorial candidate, a similar statement was made.
"Because this election has passed through a democratic process and met all the requirements, it is important for us to accept the results. We regard the result as a final one," Yusron Ihza Mahendra of a House commission dealing with home affairs told Kyodo News.
"We only hope that he can govern (Aceh) in the corridor of the unitary state of the Republic of Indonesia and improve security and welfare for the Acehnese people," he added.
Both Yusuf and Nazar were jailed under the administration of then President Megawati Sukarnoputri. Yusuf is the leader of the "young Turks" within GAM.
Born in the Aceh town of Bireuen in 1960, he graduated from Syiah Kuala University in 1987 with a degree in veterinary science and joined its faculty a year later. In 1990, he joined GAM, after the regime of strongman Suharto launched an intensive counterinsurgency campaign in Aceh.
He received a scholarship to Oregon State University in the United States in 1993, and, while studying for a master's degree in veterinary science there, he traveled to Latin America where he received training in the theory and practice of guerrilla warfare.
Armed with the know-how, he entered the GAM military wing in Tiro in North Aceh Regency on his return, helping former GAM Commander Muzakkir Manaf and Sofyan Dawood, initially as a propagandist, then as a speech writer.
His greatest contribution was a review of the GAM military structure that led to its reform and the formation of guerrilla intelligence units in 2000.
In 2003, Yusuf was arrested in Jakarta, tried and sentenced to seven years for rebellion. The sentence was increased to nine years on appeal. But when the tsunami struck Aceh on Dec. 26, 2004, he escaped a flooded prison, made his way abroad and became important behind the scenes during the Helsinki peace negotiations.
When the Aceh Monitoring Mission, consisting of monitors from the European Union and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, was deployed, Yusuf named GAM liaison.
Nazar, chairman of the Information Center for Aceh Referendum, organized a huge pro-referendum student rally in the provincial capital Banda Aceh in 2000.
He was arrested in February 2003 and sentenced to five years in jail but was released soon after the peace deal between Jakarta and GAM was signed in Helsinki in August last year.
Rich with oil and gas, Aceh has long been a key source of revenue for Jakarta, but little of this money trickled back into the local economy. Unhappy with the treatment, GAM emerged in 1976 and spent three decades fighting for independence, warfare that cost the lives of thousands of civilians.
The December 2004 tsunami, which killed about 170,000 people in Aceh, brought about changed circumstances and views among combatants that eventually led to the Helsinki peace deal last August.