Struggling together to share

Tomas Ato Freitas [James Fraser]

Natural oil and gas revenue is the biggest source of income for East Timor, and CAFOD partner Luta Hamutuk works to ensure the country’s people benefit from these profitable resources

Most of East Timor’s people live in areas with little access to information, so Luta Hamutuk (which means “struggle together”) works hard to keep communities informed.

Its co-ordinator Tomas Ato Freitas says development for the country since its recent independence has been a slow process, but protecting its people’s rights to prosper from their land’s rich natural resources is crucial to its success.

He says: “We encouraged our country to have independence so our people could have a better life – access to electricity, clean water, health clinics, hospitals, schools.

“I know this takes time. We can not magically make East Timor like Australia or Singapore overnight. We want to develop our own way, step by step, slowly.”

Government promises

The government has promised to fund health, education and infrastructure, so Luta Hamutuk monitors government budgets and petroleum revenue to ensure this happens, through investigation, advocacy and campaigning and by working alongside local communities.

Tomas says: “At the moment we are focusing on how the government uses our oil and gas resources, and the profits from this.

“We are part of the Extractive Industry Transparency Initiative and the Publish What You Pay coalition, which aims to ensure that oil, gas and mining companies publish details of the payments they make to governments in resource-rich countries and governments publish whatever they are paid by companies.”

A bank account called the Petroleum Fund was set up to hold funds from the sale of oil and gas for use in social development projects. Luta Hamutuk is part of a civil society group called the Core Group on Transparency which monitors this closely.

Tomas is one of two members of the Core Group who represent civil society on the government's officially mandated Consultative Council that monitors the Petroleum Fund.

Disappointments

Tomas says: “The government has good will for fixing roads, schools and hospitals but in practice many are still in bad condition. We are also campaigning for free schooling for everyone until high school level – and for more teachers.

“People are disappointed that it takes so long to provide clean water and good roads. They ask us questions such as ‘why is there only one teacher in the school?’ and so on.

“We explain the money is there but we realise the government also needs technical assistance in spending it too.

“In some cases, the companies they employ have not done the work properly. For example, they have tried to fix roads but, although the money has been spent, the roads are still bad.

“We also realise we need to invest in developing other sectors like tourism and agriculture.”

Because of such problems, educating the people about the realities of building a civil society is also an important element of Luta Hamutuk’s work, and it is training groups within communities to participate in the decision-making process.

As well as holding informal meetings with key government officials itself, Luta Hamutuk lobbies major governmental departments to hold regular open meetings for parliament, church and civil society.

Tomas comments: “We helped one community write a letter to the ombudsman to find out why the government hadn’t followed up on the work they had funded.

"The government should have monitored the work to ensure that the roads are built properly.”

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