East Timor’s Opposition Tops Polls But Falls Short of Majority

East Timor independence hero Xanana Gusmao briefs journalists during press conference in Dili on May 23, 2023. East Timor independence hero Xanana Gusmao's party won the parliamentary election but is short of an outright majority. VALENTINO DARIEL SOUSA/AFP via Getty Images

Independence fighter and former president Xanana Gusmao of East Timor and his opposition party have won the most votes in the island nation’s parliamentary election, but fell short of the majority needed to form a government, official results showed on Tuesday.

The election, which was held on Sunday, had been billed as a battle for premiership between Gusmao and Mari Alkatiri, who is also a resistance-era figure. A total of 17 parties contested the election.

Gusmao’s National Congress for Timorese Reconstruction (CNRT) won 42 percent of the votes with all votes counted, while Alkatiri’s Revolutionary Front for an Independent East Timor (Fretilin) had 25 percent, the electoral commission stated.

Despite receiving the most votes, the CNRT will need to form an alliance with other parties to attain a majority. Alkatiri has said that his party would accept “whatever [are] the results of this election.”

Gusmao, 76, was the first president of East Timor from 2002 to 2007. He also served as prime minister from 2007 to 2015. Alkatiri served as the country’s prime minister from 2002 to 2006.

Tensions between the two largest parties since 2018 led to the resignation of Prime Minister Taur Matan Ruak of the People’s Liberation Party (PLP) in 2020 after the government repeatedly failed to pass a budget.

But he agreed to stay until a new government was formed. Ruak’s governing coalition is currently made up of Fretilin, the PLP which he heads, and the Khunto party.

Alkatiri told Australia’s ABC News that he aims to renegotiate the 2018 Maritime Boundary Treaty that Gusmo struck with Australia if he was elected. The treaty delimited the maritime boundaries between the two nations.

“This so-called maritime boundary with Australia, we need to change something better for Timor-Leste,” Alkatiri said on Sunday.

“Why 30 percent for Australia if the pipeline comes to Timor-Leste? If it is 100 percent in our boundaries, it doesn’t make sense,” he added.

On Feb. 8, Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese gave some public comments on the gas pipeline, saying that he “discussed” the Greater Sunrise project with Australia’s Woodside Energy, adding that the project was “important for the future development of Timor Leste.”

The development of a gas pipeline in the Greater Sunrise gas fields has been a point of contention between the two countries since 2004.

The fields are located approximately 450 kilometres (280 miles) northwest of Darwin and 150 kilometres south of Timor-Leste and are estimated to be worth around $70 billion (US$50 billion), holding approximately 226 million barrels of gas.

The former Portuguese colony was occupied by Indonesia for a quarter-century and gained independence after a U.N.-sponsored referendum in 1999. Indonesia’s military responded with scorched-earth attacks that devastated the East Timorese half of the island of Timor.

The Association of Southeast Asian Nations this year granted an observer status to East Timor ahead of it becoming the regional bloc’s 11th member.

 Victoria Kelly-Clark, Reuters, and The Associated Press contributed to this report.