Adat As a Means of Unification and Its Contestation. the Case of North Halmahera

Brigitta Hauser-Schäublin (dir.) Adat and Indigeneity in Indonesia Culture and Entitlements between Heteronomy and Self-Ascription Göttingen University Press Adat as a Means of Unification and its Contestation. The Case of North Halmahera Serena Müller Publisher: Göttingen University Press Place of publication: Göttingen University Press Year of publication: 2013 Published on OpenEdition Books: 12 April 2017 Serie: Göttingen Studies in Cultural Property Electronic ISBN: 9782821875487 http://books.openedition.org Electronic reference MÜLLER, Serena. Adat as a Means of Uniﬁcation and its Contestation. The Case of North Halmahera In: Adat and Indigeneity in Indonesia: Culture and Entitlements between Heteronomy and Self-Ascription [online]. Göttingen: Göttingen University Press, 2013 (generated 10 septembre 2020). Available on the Internet: <http://books.openedition.org/gup/174>. ISBN: 9782821875487. Adat as a Means of Unification and its Contestation. The Case of North Halmahera Serena Müller Introduction After the fall of Suharto in 1998, the politics of democratisation and decentralisation triggered manifold developments with regard to adat and culture in Indonesia. In many regions, it led to a “revival of adat” (Henley and Davidson 2008) and “new politics of tradition” (Bubandt 2004). By this time, the Maluku region had experienced tensions and violent conflicts. In many parts of the region, adat was seen as “the only viable means for long-term reconciliation, social cohesion, and successful local government” (Frost 2004:1). Therefore, many efforts were undertaken to strengthen adat and adat institutions for reconciliation and peace. Bräuchler (2007) analyses two cases in Maluku and describes the strategies and challenges applied. Although she mentions divergent perceptions of the relationship between governmental politics and adat, she does not examine the consequences of an overlap of political authority and endeavours to strengthen adat. This is the point of entry of my paper. I will analyse the political authority of the district head of North Halmahera and the way he and his supporters engage in adat to promote unification and reconciliation among formerly conflicting parties. The district head’s double role as a representative of the state or dinas and as adat leader became prominent when he hosted the Fourth Congress (KMAN IV) of 100 Serena Müller Aliansi Masyarakat Adat Nusantara, the Indigenous Peoples’ Alliance of the Archipelago (AMAN) in Tobelo in April 2012. In focusing on the contested character of adat, I will, firstly, briefly portray the key actors, their background and motivation. In a second step, I will describe and analyse the currently dominant version of adat and how this version should contribute to reconciliation and peace. I will, furthermore, show how this dominant version is contested by another diverse set of actors consisting of adat leaders from different locations and other public figures. I will argue that adat in North Halmahera indeed has significant potential for reconciliation, especially the bridging of religious differences. However, the promotion of a shared adat implies a homogenisation, and takes place at the expense of the multiple local adat variations and of the migrants excluded from it – especially those from Java and those belonging to the ethnic minority of the Makean who are now living in the southern Kao region1. The district of North Halmahera was established in 2003 as part of the decentralisation and administrative restructuring of the province of North Maluku (pemekaran). Its population was about 160,000 people in 2010. While the province is numerically dominated by Muslims (75%), the majority of the district of North Halmahera is Protestant (60%).2 The district is divided into four regions.3 My research4 focuses on three of these regions: Kao, located in the south, the territory of Tobelo town and the region of Galela in the North. Discourses on adat often refer to this geographic differentiation, as does the analysis of the violence that took place there between 1999 and 2001: Kao was the region where the conflicts started; the other regions only became involved later. Different interpretations of the causes of the conflict were given by scholars in the aftermath. Brown, Wilson and Hadi (2005:18-19) relate the conflict to the establishment of the province of North Maluku in October 1999 and, therefore, see it as a result of the decentralisation policy. The administrative restructuring, as Wilson argues in another paper, led to violence that was indeed about “territory, natural resources, and ethnic solidarity”, primarily between migrants from Makean and the local residents of Pagu, one of the communities in Kao (Wilson 2005:89). A similar interpretation is given by Braithwaite et al.: They see the ethnic competition between migrants and the “indigenous population” of the region for “access to justice, access to compensation and a failure to be heard by government” as the main reason for the conflict (2010:224-225). Bubandt takes a different stand when he explains the conflict as the consequence of “the rise of a new politics of tradition” (2004:13), as a 1 The island of Makean was hit by a volcanic eruption in 1975. Therefore, many people migrated to Kao (Hondt and Sangaji 2011:4). 2 Census 2010 (BPS 2010). 3 “Region” refers to the four areas distinguished by North Halmahera’s government: Tobelo, Kao, Galela, and Loloda (see also Dinas Pariwisata dan Kebudayaan Kabupaten Halmahera Utara). 4 The field research in North Halmahera between April and May 2012 was part of a research project on indigeneity in Indonesia in the context of the project on “Cultural heritage between sovereignty of indigenous groups, the state and international organisations in Indonesia” (directed by Brigitta Hauser-Schäublin of the Interdisciplinary Research Unit, “The Constitution of Cultural Property”, at the University of Göttingen, funded by the DFG). Adat as a Means of Unification and its Contestation 101 competition between Ternate and Tidore, the two sultanates of North Maluku, over political influence in the newly established province (see also Klinken 2001). In spite of these diverse interpretations, most authors agree that the conflict had taken on a religious character, a fight between Christians and Muslims, by the end, especially in the regions of Tobelo and Galela. As Duncan points out in “Reconciliation and Revitalization”, an analysis of the revitalisation of adat for purposes of reconciliation in Tobelo, the community leaders of Tobelo concur. In their point of view, the weakness of adat in Tobelo made the town vulnerable to violence (Duncan 2009:1088). Therefore, they initiated a “resurgence of tradition” in the aftermath of the conflict, because “by strengthening, and in some cases recreating, adat institutions, they believe they can ensure future peace and stability” (ibid:1091). The currently dominant version of adat as proposed by a group of powerful Tobelo actors focuses on the establishment of unity of what is called Hibua Lamo. This means “big house” in the Tobelo language. It is used as a term for a philosophy and a spatial and social organisation based on a common adat structure. Thus, it stands for the unity of ten “indigenous communities”5 in North Halmahera, living in the four regions of the district. Hibua Lamo is thought to unite the inhabitants of North Halmahera independent of their religions. People involved in processes of adat strengthening declare that adat can “rebuild unity and prevent future conflict in the region” (ibid:1084). It has to be added that the two factions, both the group which is reshaping and promoting adat as a means of regional integration and unification, as well as its opponents, are elite people whose discourses have only been adopted or supported by people in everyday life to a limited extent. Set of Actors The “Tobelo Group” Let me describe the two different sets of actors involved in the negotiations over adat in North Halmahera. The first, which I will call the “Tobelo group”, is consciously shaping and creating a unifying version of adat for the whole of North Halmahera, which they call Hibua Lamo adat. The central figure is the current district head. 5 The term “indigenous community” is here used as the translation of the Indonesian term masyarakat adat (see the Introduction by Hauser-Schäublin and the chapter by Arizona and Cahyadi in this volume). The crucial criterion for becoming “indigenous” is self-identification. Based on this self- identification some community leaders applied for AMAN membership. As some respondents emphasised, the ten communities discussed in this chapter were encouraged to take this step by what I call the “Tobelo group”. The group’s endeavour to promote an encompassing regional adat by uniting them under the umbrella of Hibua Lamo is strongly interconnected with their membership of AMAN and engagement in the indigenous discourse. 102 Serena Müller Jiko Makolano: The district head’s election campaign poster illustrates the blurred boundaries between the adat and the administrative sphere. It merges the spatial and social order of Hibua Lamo with the state’s division of the province. Photo: Serena Müller 2012 He holds an engineering degree and started his political career as the sub-district head of Tobelo in 2001. After the conflict, the governor of North Maluku had charged him with re-establishing peaceful relationships between Christian and Muslim factions of society. This endeavour proved quite difficult: He was faced with rejection and resistance from both groups in the beginning (Bataona 2009:107-108; Dramastuti 2012:84; Braithwaite et al. 2010:223). Nevertheless, he finally succeeded in encouraging Muslim refugees on the island of Morotai to return to Tobelo, and convinced the two parties in the conflict to sign a peace declaration in April 2001. In 2005, two years after North Halmahera became a district of its own, the sub-district head was elected as district head. He is not only politically important, but also active and respected in the local branch of the Evangelical Church, the Gereja Masehi Injili di Halmahera (GMIH).

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