Re: Dollarisation in East Timor

["Alan Bradley" <alanb@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Interesting.  I'd missed this story.

My impression had been that the CNRT orientation to the escudo was at least
partly a reaction to the arrogance of the Australian imperialists - an
example of the CNRT attempting to make use of whatever room to maneuver
they had.  This decision here just plain reads as a defeat, or perhaps even
a capitulation.  It's probably not the end of the world, though.  Given
that the problem is that the Timorese masses are so profoundly excluded
from the Dollar economy, it doesn't really matter if it's a US$,
Australian$ or Portuguese escudo economy they're excluded from.  It could
be Yen, or Roubles:  if you don't have them, you can't use them.

On a more hopeful note:  In the papers here yesterday there was a report of
Falintil beginning to train new recruits, and other CNRT associated
self-defence/police groups forming in Dili.  Apparently the UN have adopted
a "we can't stop them, so we'll try to coopt them" approach.

The game's not over yet.

Alan Bradley
alanb@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

----------
From: Owen Jones <owen.jones@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
To: marxism@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: Dollarisation in East Timor
Date: Tuesday, 1 February 2000 8:55

 Source: World Socialist Web Site (http://www.wsws.org)

 Comrades were recently discussing the possibility of a radicalisation of
the East Timorese masses and even the establishment of a workers' state in
East Timor; possibly we could get a mass reaction against the invasion of
US
capital there. We all know how the Ecuadorian people reacted to
"dollarisation"...

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WSWS : News & Analysis : Asia : Indonesia & East Timor

US dollar to be official currency in East Timor