Speculation ends when Maj. Arnao Metello is confirmed as the new Portuguese representative in Timor. People demand an immediate, decisive attitude, but he is hesitant. The new legitimate order has not been carried out so far. The Army is growing restive, but Arnao Metello is the ultimate procrastinate, so nothing is done.
PIDE (the secret police force for Information and Defence of the State) has 20 members in Timor. A few are detained in guesthouse conditions. The others are not only free, but also still occupying their posts, with housing and cars provided by the State. The administrative
bureaucracy steadily resists the new order. Is the Flower Revolution a media invention? On the other hand, is this the long distance between fiction and reality?
As Dr. J. Pestana Bastos writes then:
“The Governor kept on his post for too long (a vicious basic defect). A figurehead, unrivalled as determinant of a policy and as well determined by it, cannot and should not reverse the keynote, the language, the structure, the coterie, the political
philosophy, without inevitably jeopardising himself and the Government he represents and authenticates. This means no lack of consideration or a critical view of Colonel Fernando Alves Aldeia or of its actions. If his behaviour was so far commendable, then it ceased to be so.”?
How can we talk about a bureaucratic cog, originating in colonial premises?” Maintaining the heads of Department, is a dangerous mistake that later will provoke the need to set up
emergency measures. Fundamental positions are kept too long in the hands of individuals, who are totally dependent on the old regime and ferociously opposed to the people and the new regime.
By early May, the Government imposes delegates on the radio, newspaper, and the local airline
“TAT.” Although there is a newly appointed delegate to Rádio Marconi, this entity continues
31 Later it was confirmed the death of two secret police servicemen and a bypasser.
monitoring all telephone calls as previously. Alerted Junta representative, Maj. Metello, (shrugs his shoulders and) replies that 'there is nothing we should worry about'. Knowing how Rádio Marconi was responsible for many of the political cases created during its first year of existence, we alert people to the above situation. All military mail (and that meant some 95 per cent of mail) is still being subjected to censorship. It takes one week to clear mail from the plane before distributing it. Intrigue and rumours flourish during this period.
Many people are ostensibly opposed to the new regime but keep their positions of power and influence. Some people grow disenchanted with the new regime. Others oppose the Governor, still actively working as the supreme authority in Timor. The delegate of the Portuguese Junta is barely noticeable, and definitely inoperative.
A major scandal erupts when PIDE officers (Secret Police for Information and Defence of the State) are kept on their positions under a new name of PIM (Military Information Police). They keep their Government-owned houses, cars, and other fully subsidised expenses. Another curious example is that of an Army career Captain still in charge of a sub-unit at the Army Headquarters, although, he admits being a member of the secret police.
Finally before the end of May, the Head of the Provincial Education Department is exonerated and the activities of the MP (the Youth Movement based upon the Nazi formula) finally
curtailed. Some delegates from the Portuguese Junta are scheduled to come to Timor, bringing with them - one hopes - a fresh smell of red carnations and the revolution so many have heard about, but nobody has been allowed to see so far.
With them, it comes disillusion and disenchantment. One, is a Major Garcia Leandro (later Governor of Macao) well known to the people of Timor, from a previous two year commission on there. In those days, he was a mere State Secretary with the Governor Brigadier Valente Pires. Some very serious administrative and economic misdemeanours took place under him. An official inquiry went straight into the archives, but 1,500,000,000$00 Escudos (AUD$
60,000,000) are never recovered. The local Chinese community is pretty adamant that Mr.
Leandro cannot return, and extremely co-operative with some documentary proof of his misdeeds.
Later (October 1974) some Portuguese newspapers speculate about Major Leandro being a contender to the position of Governor of Timor. Nevertheless, since some Timorese based journalists impede him he settles down as Governor of Macao. Meanwhile, back in Portugal, the weekly “Expresso” on 25 May 1974 dedicates most of its front page to Timor, under the
heading: “TIMOR: a controversial situation, now that the Temple’s hawkers are gone.”
In fact, the politico-military situation is a bit confused in Timor. After the visit by the Junta delegates (Major Garcia Leandro and Major Maia Gonçalves) instead of the true voice of a revolutionary government, people are being told that the long oblivious way the colony has been treated before, is to continue. Other people are longing for Salles Grade, previous General Chief of Staff in Timor, until 1973. During the controversial visit of the Junta’s delegates, Leandro has some very ambiguous and nebulous messages:
i) That the MFA (Movement of the Armed Forces and the backbone of the Junta) knows perfectly well, what is happening in Timor, and that there is no need for locally based people to worry or report about it.
ii) That the permanence of Aldeia’s consulate is perfectly justified because his activities are predominantly administrative and therefore not political.
iii) That the MFA would not tolerate mini-revolutions or mini-movements and as well, no rebellious acts towards the removal of the Governor and Military commander-in-chief, that could only originate in minority groups.
These ambiguous and dubious statements, lead many people to think that they are expressing more personal views than the guidelines of the MFA. Supported by these statements, the local broadcaster threatens that if Aldeia is to be removed there would be a bloodbath, due to his deep knowledge of the local people. Critically we say in the local paper that those postulated premises are fundamentally wrong. In front of hundreds of people, assembled at the School Gymnasium to hear the voices of the revolution, the then Major Leandro pronounces that the weekly “Expresso” is sensationalist and incorrect on its report about Timor. In addition, he vows to expose, after his return to Lisbon, the authors of the alarmist news who are definitely
conspiring against the peace and tranquillity of the island.
Everybody knows that there are only two people writing to “Expresso”: Cristóvão Santos, Head of the Government Printing Services and/or the author of this book. Both took part in the
“Aldeiagate” exposé when the Governor Aldeia called traitors the then rebels, now in power. Of course, one copy of the speech is smuggled out of the territory using Australian hippies on their way to Kupang and a second one sent under false name to a middleman, so as not to alert the censors.
When the military police come without warrant to search the houses of those two suspects, they cannot find the two missing copies, because they are already on their way to Lisbon. Such material at that stage is too hot to handle or even to keep. These and other facts are relevant to establish the background of what is going to happen later. The imputation of the Governor has its real start on the composition printed and withdrawn, to cover the existence of the
speech. One last detail of the session at the Gymnasium, Mr. Leandro ordering some people out because they had banners against the “Marcellist Government still in power in Timor.”
Some people could not understand this guided democracy, because when hundreds passed by it they respected it, whether they agreed or not with the banner. The representative of the Junta and the Provisional Government in power in Portugal cannot respect or even, tolerate it.
After Mr. Leandro and Mr. Gonçalves left, there is a certain void. Just before going, Garcia Leandro authenticates the broadcaster’s message on the bloodbath that could be expected if the Timorese people were deprived of Governor Aldeia. Definitely, this was no way to
decolonise the most distant and mostly forgotten colony of the crumbling Portuguese Empire!