Ramos Horta calls on powerful friends

The Australian
Stephen Fitzpatrick in Dili
April 07, 2007

JOSE Ramos Horta has made a final and powerful bid for the East Timorese presidency, appearing alongside current leader Xanana Gusmao and Bishop of Dili Ricardo da Silva in a Good Friday appeal for votes.

More than 500,000 registered East Timorese voters will elect their new head of state in the country's first independently run polls on Monday. A second runoff election is due next month if, as expected, none of the candidates attracts a majority.

Legislative elections, which could see the dominant Fretilin party ousted from government and Mr Gusmao replacing Mr Ramos Horta as prime minister, will follow mid-year.

Mr Ramos Horta's move yesterday to enlist two of the nation's most important symbols -- its heads of state and church -- could prove decisive.

Hero resistance leader Mr Gusmao spent 20 years in the jungle leading the armed resistance against Indonesian occupation, before being captured and serving jail time in Jakarta; and Bishop Ricardo represents the majority of this former Portuguese colony's dirt-poor Catholic population.

Mr Ramos Horta has in recent days been playing up a perceived antagonism between the church, an institution that still governs the rhythms of daily life for most East Timorese, and the Marxist-based Fretilin party, which was a key political element -- though not the only one -- in the 24-year anti-Indonesian resistance.

"This Sunday is resurrection Sunday, and on Monday we will see the resurrection of democracy for East Timor," Mr Ramos Horta said, after statements by Mr Gusmao and Bishop Ricardo urging a peaceful election.

There have been scattered violent incidents in recent days between groups of various candidates' supporters.

The bloody public unrest last year, in which dozens were killed and seriously injured and which resulted in Fretilin prime minister Mari Alkatiri being replaced as the head of government by Mr Ramos Horta, is lately being characterised by all sides as the fault of their various opponents.

There was no single cause but most observers agree that a confluence of political ambition from a range of players lay at its heart. Many of those players remain intimately connected to the presidential struggle, although the position itself is largely ceremonial.

Monday's poll is the first to be run entirely under East Timorese control; the UN will provide material and logistical assistance.

Of the eight candidates, only three are thought to have a chance: Mr Ramos Horta; Fretilin party head and parliamentary president Francisco "Lu Olo" Guterres; and a distant outsider, Democratic Party chairman Fernando "Lasama" de Araujo.

Policy has played a secondary role to personal point-scoring in much of the campaign, and the strategic support of Bishop Ricardo and Mr Gusmao for the latter's long-time ally, Mr Ramos Horta, attracted scathing criticism from the Fretilin camp yesterday.

"It's easy to understand the symbolism of having them together -- it gives out the message that this is the favourite," the Fretilin candidate, Mr Guterres, said at his home in the leafy harbourside Dili suburb of Farol.

"But for me as a Catholic, this is holy week, a time to reflect seriously on religious life, not to manipulate religion in support of politics," Mr Guterres said.

Mr Guterres also criticised Mr Ramos Horta's use in campaign materials of a photograph depicting the Nobel Peace Prize laureate meeting Pope Benedict XVI last year.

"Do people know whether they are voting for the Pope or for Ramos Horta?" he asked.

Fretilin has been criticised from both within and without for the authoritarian style of its leadership, which includes Mr Guterres and Dr Alkatiri.

East Timor's political landscape is littered with minor opposition parties, including several formed as breakaway movements from Fretilin in the seven years since independence.

Should Mr Guterres succeed in his bid to become president, a reinvigorated Fretilin is likely to then propel Dr Alkatiri back into the prime minister's office after the mid-year legislative elections.

But some believe that failure for Fretilin at the presidential polls could lead to crumbling support for the country's most powerful political organisation, paving the way for Mr Gusmao's ascent to the prime ministership.

In what had the appearance of an early concession of defeat, dark horse Mr de Araujo and fellow candidates Lucia Lobato, Joao Corrascalao and Manuel Xavier do Amaral complained bitterly yesterday of electoral commission irregularities.

They alleged scrutineer identity cards produced by the commission were incomplete and had been issued too late, leaving the powerful Fretilin machine, with its massive grassroots backing across the country, in a stronger polling-day position.