To Become Indonesian: Experience, Perception, and Hope of East

Timor Refugees after Referendum (1999-2009)

Silverius C. J. M. Lake

and Frederikus Fios

Character Building Development Center, Mass Communication Program, Communication Department, Faculty of

Economics & Communication, Bina Nusantara University, Jakarta, Indonesia 11480

Character Building Development Center, Computer Science Department, School of Computer Science, Bina Nusantara

University, Jakarta, Indonesia 11480

Keywords: Experience, Perception , East Timor

Abstract: Nowadays and by temperament of East Timor refugees regarding the national identity of Indonesia, become

a kind of problem. The objective of this research tends to find the national identity of Indonesia among East

Timor refugees in the border area West Timor Indonesia, after the referendum 1999. However, the locations

of the research are the border as follows; Kupang district, North Central Timor district, Belu district and

Malaka district. The important of this research is to know their nationality of Indonesia through their

experience, perception, and hope. Other idea in this article is the sustainability of the national identity of

Indonesia for East Timor refugees. And the research uses qualitative method especially in-depth interviews,

literature study, narrative description and focus group discussion. The theoretical frame uses community

psychology and social history. The expectation of this research is to strengthen East Timor nationality of

Indonesia.

1 INTRODUCTION

On completing this article, my concern turns to my

research about the East Timor refugees who are living

in the border area between Timor-Leste and West

Timor, East Nusa Tenggara Province. To become

Indonesian for East Timor people who are living now

in West Timor is the core issue on this research. Three

keywords will help us to do research on Indonesian

nationality of East Timor people who are living in the

border area in West Timor. For sometimes East Timor

people enter upon to Timor-Leste, it means that they

are still yearning their hometown in Timor-Leste.

Those three keywords on the studies are experience,

perception and hope. The experience of the East

Timor people can be seen in the history of East Timor

especially colonized by Portugal for a long period,

450 years. Then, the history of East Timor related to

the integration with Republic of Indonesia for two

decades that has made a special experience. I will also

describe tragic experience of East Timor people after

the Referendum 1999 which caused them left their

home town for West Timor, the East Nusa Tenggara

province. The tragedy after the referendum make

their nationality of Indonesia was eroded.

On experience, the first keyword, we can find and

use the thought of David Hume (1711-76). He is

Scottish, born in Edinburgh, and generally regarded

as the greatest of British empiricist. Hume was an

historian and a philosopher. He developed a

philosophy based on impression and making

substantial use of the new doctrine of the association

of ideas (Lacey, 1996). East Timorese experience as

refugees can be related to the concept of experience

and perception according to Hume. In his opinion as

an empiricist, Hume thought on experience that a

human being is a centre of experience, awareness,

thought, and feeling. Those things are related to

impression that connected to East Timorese

knowledge and experience as an Indonesian.

Furthermore, how is about perception? When we

talk about perception, the second keyword, it is very

complicated. The analysis of perceiving is

complicated by the variety of its objects. Therefore, it

suggests us to pay attention comprehensively and

factual. For example, how is perceiving the redness

of Smith’s face related to perceiving that his face is

red, that he is angry, that he is afraid? And can one

perceive an object without perceiving facts about it?

Usually ‘perceive’ is a success or achievement if we

Lake, S. and Fios, F.

To Become Indonesian: Experience, Perception, and Hope of East Timor Refugees after Referendum (1999-2009).

DOI: 10.5220/0010010800002917

In Proceedings of the 3rd International Conference on Social Sciences, Laws, Arts and Humanities (BINUS-JIC 2018), pages 467-470

ISBN: 978-989-758-515-9

467

can only perceive what is there and is true. But we can

misperceive for example make mistakes about what

se perceive. Perception is a complex notion, and two

main problems concern its relations to sensory

experience and to intellectual notions like belief,

judgment, inference. (Lacey, 1996) If we attempt to

start from East Timorese experience as refugees, we

can only perceive their experience as far as we keep

the sense data. The sense data supposed to serve as a

bridge between us and the East Timorese experience

in their hometown (East Timor) then in the border

area of West Timor, East Nusa Tenggara Province.

I will also try to explain the third keyword namely

hope. The definition of hope can be described as well

as a feeling of expectation and desire for a certain

thing to happen. For example, the East Timorese

people hope looked through their thinking, feelings,

belongings in the hope of becoming pure Indonesian.

Besides, East Timor refugees who are living in the

border area of West Timor hope our help to save

them. They need something good for their life and

hope for the future as genuine Indonesian (Soanes &

Stevenson, 2008). My explanation on the hope of East

Timor people in the border area related to needs of

human being as usual. Human basic needs are clean

water, food, house, sleeping, and so on. In this case,

the government should provide all especially for the

East Timor refugees. For chronically and extremely

hungry man, they need plenty of food. If only he or

she is guaranteed food for the rest in life, he or she

will be perfectly happy. Life itself tends to be defined

in terms of eating. Anything else will be defined as

unimportant for example freedom, love, community

feeling, respect, philosophy, may all be waved aside

that are useless since they fail to fill stomach (Lake,

1992).

Those three keywords describe background of this

article. I have shown some problems that needled East

Timorese in the border area to stay in Indonesia or

homecoming again in Timor-Leste. I underline the

East Timor people are in dilemma situation, on one

hand they are living in Indonesia, on the other hand

they are going to homecoming again in Timor-Leste.

The East Timor people in the border area should

become Indonesian actually. It is naturally great.

2 METHOD

The problem of East Timorese people in the border

area West Timor Indonesia is how to become

Indonesian, viewed from their experience,

perception, and hope. To fulfil this article, I will use

some methods based on the social history. The focus

of this research is on the history of common people.

To get a comprehensive description regarding of data

collection, I have done library research, interview

method, and narrative method (Fay, 1998). To enrich

the data collection, I offered a Focus Group

Discussion (FGD) in place with regencies’ leaders

who are making the policies for handling East Timor

refugees.

By the narrative method, East Timor people have

told their experiences and hopes for living in the

border area, then I as researcher measured and

interpreted the story through a psychology of

oppressed as an approach. How far their collective

memories on their hometown and homeland Timor-

Leste. And, how far their national identity of

Indonesia. Are they psychologically motivated by

their homeland Timor-Leste or Indonesia? The

meaning of those perceptions, their face and heart can

be caught through narrative approach and interview

method. We can see their face and we can feel their

feelings when they tell the story verbally (Garraghan,

1957). Coordination with East Timor people in the

border area was held to show their statement, attitude,

behaviour, trust, story-telling, in the resettlement

place. I as researcher was among them for a month.

Furthermore, as an observer, the researcher has

intended to know and to interpret the East Timor

people orientation whether towards Timor-Leste or

Indonesia.

3 LITERATURE REVIEW

To discover perception and hope of East Timor

People as Indonesian citizen, they all want to become

Indonesian if they get prosperity, safety, happiness,

health life, self-esteem, independent, political rights,

positive identity both individually and communal.

We believe that it is important to start with a focus on

the people and communities with whom community

psychologist work, the way community psychologists

think about the problems those communities and

people face, and the goals towards which community

psychologist works. Community psychologists are

concerned with the issues and problems facing

disadvantaged people, problems that have deep

historical roots. The journeys of disadvantaged

people have been ones of pain and suffering,

dislocation and colonization, oppression and

marginalization. Society has constructed stories about

disadvantaged people, making them into something

different between you and me. These stories are often

of the victim-blaming variety and help members of

dominant groups to rationalize their role in

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contributing to and perpetuating the oppression of

disadvantaged people. They also serve to disconnect

disadvantaged people from the journey of their people

and themselves. Listening to the stories of

disadvantaged people is a first step in undoing the

damaging stories that society has constructed about

those people, in this case the East Timor people

(Nelson & Prilleltensky, 2005).

Amanda Wise in “Nation, Trans-nation, Diaspora:

Locating East Timorese Long-distance Nationalism”

showed the result of the research with the East

Timorese refugee community in Sidney Australia

(Wise, 2004). Amanda Wise has adopted

transnational dimensions to their practices of long-

distance nationalism. Moving beyond a simple

homeland to refugee trajectory, Amanda Wise takes

the position that transnational connections and

influences must be seen to be both located and

interconnected beyond the bounds of the group and

its homeland. However, Amanda Wise always

contributed her article on East Timor. In this article

“Embodying Exile: Trauma and Collective Identities

among East Timorese in Australia”, Amanda Wise

has explored diasporic community and transnational

identities (Wise, 2006). Those issues have emanated

from scholars working in cultural studies and

contemporary anthropology. With a little attention

has been paid to specific experiences of refugee

diasporas, and particularly role of trauma and

embodiment in creation of these moral communities.

Based on her research with the East Timorese

diaspora in Australia, Wise has shown this article

looks at the performative dimension of diaspora’s

political campaign for East Timor independence

(Wise, 2004).

Januar Achmad on his article “East Timorese

Refugees in West Timor”was published by JSTOR in

“Out of Ashes” Book Chapter 12 showed the situation

and condition East Timorese refugees in West Timor,

East Nusatenggara Province since 1999-2000. Januar

put many considerations on his article as follows;

exodus from East Timor, dispersal, the camps, self-

help projects, Indonesian government responses,

violence against refugees, health, and repatriation.

One of the important ideas was about repatriation of

the refugees. In general, West Timor community and

government received the refugees well since early

September 1999. Despite this, most of the refugees

wanted to return home (Achmad, 2003).

Starting from those journals above, I as the author

ensure that the topic in my research is new entry point

to the East Timor studies especially on refugees. My

focus is on a new life of East Timor people in the

border area. We find their new life, their experience,

their perception and their hope for Indonesia.

Therefore, they are going to become Indonesia and to

build their national identity of Indonesia in

resettlement place.

4 TO BECOME INDONESIA OR

HOMECOMING TO

TIMOR-LESTE

It was a regulation for East Timor people in the border

area West Timor, East Nusa Tenggara province who

choose to stay in Indonesia or homecoming to Timor-

Leste should follow the registration and voting

process for 17-year olds and up. With the regulation,

the East Timor people who are living in the camps

and resettlement place make question why their

nationality of Indonesia should be checked.

Thousands of East Timor people join the election

since June 6 – June 9, 2001. The result of the election,

98% of 100,000 people chose to stay in Indonesia. It

means majority of East Timor people kept stay to

become Indonesian. East Nusa Tenggara province

has noted this event as a big achievement peacefully

without chaos. By the result of the election, some of

East Timor people in the border area will join the

repatriation program for returning home. The East

Nusa Tenggara Province facilitated and protected

refugees who chose to return home. Meanwhile, East

Timor people chose to stay in Indonesia, joined the

relocation or resettlement program (Sarong, 2001).

An attempt to read and to interpret the election for

East Timor people in the border area. There are two

main points of the East Timor people. Firstly, since

1976 the East Timor people already integrated with

the Republic of Indonesia as Indonesian citizen.

Secondly, after the Referendum 1999, although they

failed or lost in the election, they still felt as pure

Indonesian citizen. The East Nusatenggara province

in this case, should receive and to appreciate their

nationality of Indonesia. More than that, East Timor

and West Timor people are one ethnic and one

brotherhood. Any further description is about identity

transformation that underestimate their nationality of

Indonesia. What should East Nusatenggara province

do for East Timor people in the border area? The East

Nusatenggara province had to add little more

attention for strengthen their Indonesian. Leaders on

the province can understand the East Timor people

narration, then mix East Timor people with

EastTimor people in relocation or resettlement place.

Furthermore, to observe East Timor people in the

border area like Tuapukan (Kupang), Naen, Oebkin,

To Become Indonesian: Experience, Perception, and Hope of East Timor Refugees after Referendum (1999-2009)

469

Napan, Keun, Ponu (Nord Central Timor – TTU),

Motaain, Atambua (Belu), Motamasin (Malaka), we

impress that they still have emotional, traditional and

culture of East Timor. Their collective memory on

East Timor is still strong. They have strong

perception and hope on Timor-Leste as the place of

their ancestor. Therefore, everyone has responsibility

to make them becoming Indonesia. This research is

going to find solution and strategies to strengthen

their nationality of Indonesia. Historical experience is

related to the past and the future. Historical narration

of East Timor refugees is collective memory that they

told from one generation to other generation. As well

as the national identity of Indonesia should be

transmitted from one generation to the next

generation, including East Timor people in the border

area. We need a sustainable historical narration based

on awareness, wisdom, and vision of Indonesian from

this generation to the next generation.

The sustainability is a contemporary issue and

properly description for continuing the national

identity of Indonesia. The historical reflection here

represented the East Timor refugees’ hope and we all

hope that they will become Indonesia again and again

sustainably. It will enlighten and revivify the East

Timor refugees in the border area. Then, the purpose

of this research is to outline the sustainability of

becoming Indonesia.

5 CONCLUSION

This study shows that to become Indonesian is still a

problem for East Timorese people in the border area.

The problems in the border area can be solved as

follows; reducing violence done by themselves in the

border area. Then, building and maintaining social

relationship, both among them and the local

communities. Furthermore, improving the economic

life of border residents. The role of government both

national government and the East Nusatenggara

province is to hold cooperation in managing conflict,

contributes the conducive conditions for the East

Timor refugees and local community. It seems clear

that we can make negotiations for solving the

problems among them peacefully.

Today, East Timor people are living in the border area

well in their relationship with local people. To make

them becoming Indonesian, we need to respond and

to reply their ill experience, to direct their perception,

and to fulfil their hope. In an increasingly nationality

of Indonesia, we should continuously strengthen

good-neighborly and forwards looking policies of

friendship and cooperation in the interest of

respective national development goals as well as the

peace, progress and stability for our beloved country

Indonesia. Sustainability thought about the history of

East Timor refugees is largely history in the border

area. It directs us to know the past, the present, and

the future of East Timor refugees in becoming

Indonesia.

REFERENCES

Achmad, J. (2003). East Timorese Refugees in West Timor

Out of the Ashes, ed J J Fox and D B Soares. Canberra,

Australia: ANU Press

Fay, B. (1998). History and Theory (p 34-52). Oxford, UK:

Blackwell Publisher.

Garraghan, G. J. (1957). A Guide to Historical Method (pp

327-332). East Fordham Road, New York: Fordham

University Press

Lacey, A. R. (1996). A Dictionary of Philosophy. London

and New York: Routledge.

Lake, S.C.J.M. (1992). Self Actualization according to

Abraham Harold Maslow Thesis. College of

Philosophy, Ledalero, Flores

Nelson, G., & Prilleltensky, I. (2005). Community

Psychology: In Pursuit of Liberation and Well-Being.

New York: Palgrave Macmillan.

Sarong, F. (2001). NTT dan Beban Pengungsi.

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Wise, A. (2004). Embodying Exile: Trauma and Collective

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Social Analysis Berghahn Journal, 48(3), pp. 24-39

Wise, A. (2004). Nation, Trans-nation, Diaspora: Locating

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