E Timor rebel's Aussie suburban life

"The Australian - June 06, 2006
Paige Taylor

HE is the face of East Timor's rebels but 11 years ago Alfredo Reinado was living in a crowded Dandenong flat with his wife, Maria, and young family plotting his return to their homeland.

Reinado - who had been captured by Indonesian troops to work as a porter - captained a friend's fishing boat to Darwin, arriving on May 29, 1995.

Maria and their baby son Jose were among the 15 other men, women and children to make that journey. Then just 28, Reinado is a hero to those who were on board.

While many of his passengers thought of their arrival in Australia as a happy ending, Reinado saw it as a safe place to begin the struggle proper.

He returned four years later, joining his countrymen on their final march to independence in the lead-up to democratic elections in 2001, sacrificing his family life when his wife and children remained in the relative proximity and safety of Darwin.

Maria Reinado is again in Australia while her husband acts on the principles they both share. This time she is pregnant with the couple's fourth child and staying with relatives in Perth to avoid Dili's violent mobs.

Reinado, meanwhile, is living on his wits in the hills outside Dili after walking off the job as commander of the 33-strong military police unit with 20 other members of the military police and four members of the police riot squad on May 4.

They took two trucks loaded with weapons and ammunition to hilltop retreats.

"She understands, she is from a rebel family," Reinado's aunt Veira Alves told The Australian.
Maria Reinado is receiving occasional phone calls from her husband and is busy trying to find a house to rent in Perth.

But she is deeply worried about her husband's safety and becoming increasingly disheartened by the cost of accommodation driven by the state's commodities boom.
Her husband has been out of work since May 4.

"If you want my story, what do I get?" she said.

Friends say Maria, 28, was in high school in Dili when she met her husband-to-be, who friends say was working as a mechanic. They shared a sense of humour and a strong sense of social justice.

Maria's friend and fellow CNRT member from the 1990s, Angelina, said: "Maria is a very patient woman. She doesn't mind when her husband leaves her ... She is supportive."

Reinado's rise to rebel commander this year has surprised Australian friends who recall a fun-loving father and husband who liked to go fishing and watch the West Coast Eagles play.
Florindo Lemos, 32, who shared the cramped Melbourne flat with Reinado and his young family in their first months in Australia, said Reinado was moderate compared with some in the more radical Fretilin independence movement.

But he was deeply moved by injustice and cried at stories of his countrymen being tortured by Indonesians.

"He is such a good man, I felt so shocked when I saw on TV what he is doing but I know there must be a reason," said Lemos, who now lives in Perth with his Australian wife, Sarah, and their two young children.

"Alfredo stands up for what is right ... he is only doing what is right for everybody."

Reinado and Maria moved to Perth, where they had relatives, from Melbourne in 1995 and he spent the next four years working behind the scenes for East Timor's independence, as a member of the Perth branch of the Conselho Nacional de Resistencia Timorense (CNRT).

In Perth in 1997, Reinado stood shoulder-to-shoulder with independence activist Jose Ramos Horta - now foreign minister in a government Reinado is leading a rebellion against - after he and other CNRT members met Ramos Horta in the West Australian capital to discuss fundraising for the East Timorese resistance.

At that meeting was fellow CNRT member Ade, who did not want his last name published - who said Reinado was measured and his views were not the most extreme of the group.
"He is very smart and sensible," he said.

"I am proud of what he is doing but it is mixed because of the effect on people."
Graham Wallis, an Australian who worked with the CNRT in Perth, said Reinado maintained a calm resolve.

"He wanted to do whatever it takes to get Indonesia out of East Timor," he said."



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