Picture of Francesco Faraci East Timor and Ego Lemos' Perspective by Francesco Faraci - Tuesday, 18 September 2012, 11:09 AM

In July I went to East Timor as an international observer for the parliamentary election which took place on the 7th of July, 2012. I was located south west, very close to the border with West Timor (Indonesia) in the Suai, Covalima district. As soon as I landed in Dili I was surprised by the lack of high rising buildings and by the possibility to look around and be able to see the beautiful hills surrounding the capital. It is quite a strange feeling to leave behind the pompousness of western civilization for a more humble existence where everything superfluous is pretty much absent, at least for now.

Background:

East Timor’s existence is signed in blood. It was unilaterally declared a sovereign state in December 1975 ending 450 years of Portuguese rule over the territory. The newly established independence by the leftist FRETILIN was not recognized by its closest neighbour Indonesia which a year later in 1976 started 24 years of ruthless occupation. Throughout the next two decades FRETILIN’s armed wing, FALINTIL resisted against the Indonesian National Armed Force (TNI). Indonesian occupation resulted in a human toll of 180.000 people, a little more than a quarter of the population.[1] The 1999 referendum with 78.6 percent of East Timorese electorate voting for independence resulted in TNI retaliation; 1,000 civilians were killed, 250.000 became refugees and much of the existing infrastructure was destroyed.

East Timorese history of violence and subjugation going from before the Portuguese to after Indonesian occupation has resulted in dire poverty, lack of proper infrastructure and human capital. Indeed, at around US$731 per capita GDP as for 2005, East Timor is one of the poorest countries in the world, with a Human Development Index (HDI) ranking 147 of 187 states and with 37.4% of the population living under the poverty line. East Timor risked becoming a failed state, but it avoided this pejorative title by working tirelessly to achieve greater material and human development while constructing a cohesive national identity and political purpose to strengthen democratic participation and accountable governance.

Interview with Ego Lemos:

From a friend back in Melbourne I was directed to Ego Lemos, a man with exceptional emphatic characteristics and with strength to bring about change which is admirable and inspiring. Ego is the founder of the country’s first Permaculture centre, Permatil (Permaculture Timor Lorosa’e) and of a successful sustainable agriculture network called HASATIL. Apart from being an environmental troubadour he is also a musician, singer and songwriter. He is mostly known for his song ”Balibo” which became the theme song of the 2009 film Balibo, about the death of five Australian journalists at the hands of Indonesian troops invading the country. The song was awarded as the best original song composed for the screen at the 2009 Screen Music Award[2] and for having received the 2009 APRA award for best song in a movie.[3]

Before departing to Suai for the elections I went to pay a visit to him to get a better feeling of the country .

This is the sum of our conversation:

The elections are a really important moment for East Timor, as they will decide whether the country is considered a ‘failed state’ in regards to concepts of flawed democracy or has successfully and peacefully reached the age of ‘maturity’. Ego emphasised the need as ‘a people’ to recognize the failure of past governments to bring about justice; nowadays a culture of impunity still prevails. Redistribution of wealth and investment should be directed to rural areas where most of development is missing and where the majority of the population lives. A comprehensive integration between the rural communities and the Dili elite is fundamental for East Timor to implement a better system of powers decentralization.

Education:

Schools have no teachers, no supplies, no tables or chairs, how should the young learn about their culture, their language, and the power which resides within knowledge and the ability to think for themselves and become autonomous? Most of the education in Dili is ‘superficial’, dealing mainly with the opportunity to get well-paid jobs with the Government, International Non-Governmental Organisations (INGOs) or abroad, thus corrupting and corporatizing education. Education for the sake of having an income corrupts teachings and knowledge formation becomes hijacked by profit. Indeed, there is an extreme lack of human capital in regard to local expertise, which is lost in favour of INGOs. Ego stressed the importance of local expertise and grassroots activities. They form the basis for autonomy and collective struggle. Development, he explained must start from the people and not offered from above or even worse from offshore.

Permatil tries indeed to keep their projects small because large scale projects are understood to lose grip on reality and swing to and fro chasing funding from one donor to another. This is one of the most serious and aggravating issue damaging the development industry. Indeed, INGOs tend to work within three years mandate to then leave the community in a worse situation than before. What is the reason? Not enough time has been spent on building independence and autonomy. While we were there compost toilets were being made out of local natural materials which can easily be recycled.

Ownership of land:

The government together with the famous-infamous World Bank wants to change the law pertaining the ownership of the land. Illegal loggings at the hands of corporations, slowly infiltrating within the territory, are dismantling the cultural and traditional edifice around which the ‘Spirit’ of East Timor is woven. Modernization with the facilitation of Christianity has forced community into a vicious rational discourse. Local communities have been directed away from their original connectedness to nature and have been slowly convinced that the forest is empty of such beings as benign, evil, and ancestors’ spirits.

Lisan, the speaking power of the elders, was thus threatened by scientism, disenchanting and disenfranchising the people from the ‘traditional law.’ The Chefes’ (elected leaders) authority was drastically diminished and they became to be seen as liars. In this way the land did not need to be protected from buyers, as ancestors’ dwellings were eradicated from the surroundings ‘jungle’, the land could now be sold to MNCs (Multinational Corporations) at a price fixed by them. Legislation has been changed in a way that the land needs written tittles of ownerships. This involves the division of plots using the criteria of ‘class values’ where the most profitable land requires the higher price.

The USAID’s property rights project, Ita Nia Rai (Our Land), is now collecting all the claims for registration. These once finalized will support land sales and purchases. All political parties in East Timor, Ego remarked, are avoiding discussing land issues, while at the same time the project funded by USAID has been covertly brought forward. The NDP (National Development Programme) was also fundamental towards reaching the final step of issuing land ownership certificates by introducing processes like the ‘Green Revolution,’ which encourages cash crops, agricultural sectioning, mono-cropping and bio-diversity’s decadence.

However, Ego does not give up, but resist the storm coming from a blind liberal world where states are run for MNCs instead for men. He advocated for the creation of a sustainable agricultural industry/movement and for the essential role of civil society in creating land networking to preserve the traditional ownership of the land thus avoiding inconvenient and unfair sell offs to dehumanised corporations. USAID and other international agencies together with the corporate world promoted the intensive cultivation of coffee to be bought at the locked price of 0.36 cents per Kg or the substitution of coffee for rice and other various products of necessity. Congruently, dependence is already inbuilt in the major sponsored development schemes. Nonetheless, in the Ermera District, where coffee plantations are dominant, farmers have adopted “occupy strategies” to resist land grabbing and to push for land reformations to safeguards firstly and foremost the locals.

Ego remarked this point explaining that after independence with development schemes it was also introduced a new kind of colonialism based on aid and investments, nothing more, nothing less than a serious and damaging cultural invasion. Capitalism does not wait. After 1999 the UNTAET (UN Transitional Administration in East Timor) introduced a new modus operandi, the ‘3$ law’ for projects and clean-ups. In brief everything that before was done in a collective way and without payments was now being surpassed by UN sponsored wage labour/slavery, to the extent that collectives dismantled and workers stopped working to better the infrastructure or to clean the streets, if not paid. People started looking for money instead of food.

Nonetheless, resistance to exploitation and the slavery of property rights in regards to land ownership and agricultural production is mounting. Ego continuously works to promote his country through music and permaculture. He offers expertise on farming to locals in order to make communities’ knowledge and practices more effective.

He does this by asking local farmers what their necessities are and by providing a slow but long lasting and sustainable solution to their farming practices. In Laga, he is now working on aquaculture and the building of compost toilets. In November this year he will host a week long workshop on permacultural practices, mainly targeting young people but not only with discussions on the present and future of East Timor. He thinks advocacy and emancipation are essential component of development. He invited me to be alert to what surrounds me, and especially to pay attention to what is not said, or avoided. Ego claimed that justice need to be brought to East Timor firstly regarding the crimes committed by Indonesians which they still go unpunished; secondly regarding the new wave of colonialism brought by development; and thirdly to internal corruption and maladministration.

East Timor is a beautiful small and young country; however it swims in a pool full of big white sharks. If it wants to survive depletion it better strives for a different kind of ‘elevation’.

[1] Damien Kingsbury & Michael Leach, East Timor: Beyond Independence (Clayton: Monash University Press, 2007):1.

[2] Noonan, Kathleen (28 November 2009), “The man has soil and soul,” Courier Mail.

[3] Mengel, Noel, “O Hele Le review”, Courier Mail.