Timor-Leste’s presidential election presages ‘a political earthquake’. Will it?

Timor-Leste is headed for a fresh period of political uncertainty after Nobel Prize laureate José Ramos-Horta promised a “political earthquake in the national Parliament” should he win the April 19 run-off for the country’s presidency, for which he is favourite.

Ramos-Horta fell short of the 50% +1 vote needed to avoid a run-off, polling 46.58% in final counting. He will face second place-getter, incumbent Francisco “Lu’Olo” Guterres, 67.

Lu’Olo was elected in 2017 with the backing of the two major political parties, Fretilin and the Gusmão-led Congress for National Reconstruction of Timor (CNRT). Since then the two sides have fallen out once more as Timorese politics descended into acrimony over a range of moves made by Lu’Olo, in particular the election of the Parliament’s president (a role similar to speaker) that Horta described in a press conference Sunday as “unconstitutional”. 

The country’s economy retracted by 8% last year, youth unemployment remains high and malnutrition remains a serious problem among children, problems that Ramos-Horta laid squarely at the feet of the current government and its presidential backer during his campaign.

A range of observers in the tiny nation, including from Lu’Olo’s own party, said it appeared almost impossible for Lu’Olo to make up enough ground with Ramos-Horta and his backers priming to split the fragile ruling parliamentary alliance.

A win will position Ramos-Horta’s main backer, independence and former president and prime minister Xanana Gusmão, 75, for another run at the prime minister’s job, or as the government’s de facto leader. This would give him a long-awaited chance to kickstart the controversial US$18 billion Tasi Mane oil and gas project that has stumbled for more than a decade.

Tasi Mane would create the massive infrastructure on Timor needed to tap into undersea energy reserves in the seas between the former Portuguese and Indonesian colony and Australia that are piped to the Northern Territory for processing.

‘Friends today, allies tomorrow’

Ramos-Horta was the nation’s second president from 2007-12 after a short stint as prime minister (2006-07). He was foreign minister from 2002-06 and won the 1996 Nobel Peace Prize along with Catholic Bishop Carlos Belo, who later retired and left the country, citing ill health.

Ramos-Horta told Portuguese wire service Lusa that when he secures the top job he could bring on a censure against the government within a week. He then plans to try to rejig parliamentary alliances between the two main parties and three smaller parties who hold the balance of power, saying in a press briefing on March 19 that “alliances change in democracies — friends today, allies tomorrow”.

“Once elected, I would immediately begin dialogue negotiations with all the parties, with civil society to see their spectrum ahead for the next few months, always preoccupied, always focusing on dialogue,“ he said on Sunday.

Swinburne University international politics Professor Michael Leach told Crikey: “The fact Gusmão didn’t run for president himself suggests he wants to be prime minister again, or at least the major force in government.

“Parliamentary elections are currently scheduled for May 2023, but a new president elected with Gusmão’s support could see those elections brought forward, or the current Parliament reconfigured to put Gusmão’s CNRT back in government.” 

Ramos-Horta is widely expected to comfortably win the run-off due to the backing of Gusmão and his personal popularity, signalling an apparent shift in the polity that his strong showing represents. There is growing concern in the country about the dwindling supplies of oil and gas that underpin government budgets and the nation’s sovereign wealth fund that observers estimate has between 15 and 20 years to run.

Fretilin believes the answer to Timor’s economic future is to build and create industries rather than rely on massive investment in infrastructure for fossil fuels, whose future is far from certain.

President and Parliament elected separately

The country’s semi-presidential system sees the president and Parliament elected separately. The president has significant powers, including the ability to counsel political parties during their shifting alliances in the past five years. He can even dissolve Parliament, a power that the country’s courts have said they will not test.

These powers have been on particular display during Lu’Olo’s term in office. Despite being backed by Gusmão in 2017, he upended the 2018 general election vote by refusing to approve the appointments of eight ministerial positions due to claims of corruption in a nation where it is all too common in elite politics and business.

This led to a subsequent budget crisis and the rejigging of the ruling parliamentary alliance that sidelined the CNRT and saw one-time Gusmão ally, José Maria Vasconcelos — known by his nom de guerre Taur Matan Ruak and who leads the small People’s Liberation Party — retain the prime ministership. He holds power by working with CNRT’s arch rivals Fretilin and alliance partner KHUNTO — the bloc that it is believed Ramos-Horta wants to move to CNRT’s side to achieve a majority in Parliament.

If Ramos-Horta succeeds in avoiding a run-off, it will be the first time this has happened for a candidate without the backing of both major parties, bolstering his belief that voters have backed him to make landmark parliamentary changes.

The re-emergence of Gusmão — Timor-Leste’s inaugural president from 2002-07 and prime minister from 2007-12 — in a major leadership role could prove a fresh headache for Australia. He will be far more assertive dealing with Australia and is a public supporter of Australian lawyer Bernard Collaery, the subject of an ongoing secret trial around the Australian government’s alleged spying on the Timor-Leste cabinet in 2004 during negotiations on maritime boundaries, authorised by then-foreign affairs minister Alexander Downer.

He may also resume his quest for backing for the Tasi Mane project, including from Chinese investors. Australia has long been wary of growing Chinese influence in the young nation.