"Adeus Konflitu, Benvidu Dezenvolvimentu!" (Goodbye violence, welcome development!) proclaim large banners that hang over the streets of the East Timorese capital Dili. Precisely ten years ago, the East Timorese chose in a referendum to break with Indonesia. Jakarta responded toughly. Correspondent Irene Slegt recently returned to Dili to seek out some of the people who lived through that period.
 

Report by Irene Slegt

The celebration of the 10th anniversary of the 1999 referendum is a chance for the Timorese government to try to shake off East Timor’s image of a war-torn nation. For months workers have been busy painting the facades and clean up the rubble. But the scars of the waves of violence - 1999, 2002 and 2006 - are difficult to hide.
 

I returned to East Timor to find some of the Timorese with whom I shared the concrete floor of Unamet’s compound as a refugee in 1999. With them I watched from the balconies how the Indonesian military and its Timorese militia took revenge by burning down the town – exactly as they had warned they would do if the people were to vote for independence.
 

Ten years on, I was wondering how people now think of their nation’s bitter dawn. Do they regret their choice now they know how difficult independence has turned out to be?
 

Pedro Unamet
In a dusty courtyard, I find Pedro Unamet. He was born in the UN compound amidst the sound of gunfire and named by the UN doctor who helped deliver him – (Unamet is the acronym for United Nations Mission in East Timor). He and his cousins are playing snooker with marbles on a mini snooker table.

 
When I ask his family whether they think life is better now than before 1999, an awkward silence falls, till one of his uncles says: "50-50". Food was a lot cheaper, education better and it was easier to make a living, he explains. Even security, which used to be 'the plaster on the wounds' during the early years of independence, is not something people take for granted ever since the violence that rocked the country in 2006.

 
Mira Martins
Mira Martins had put all her savings into rebuilding her house. When the town erupted in a frenzy of communal violence in 2006, her house again went up in flames. This time it made her deeply sad. "The arsonists were people from the neighbourhood who were envious of our success", she said bitterly. She had to flee to the UN again. And she has not recovered enough faith in the future to rebuild her house for a second time. 
 

Luisa Marcal
In a narrow lane, near piles of foul smelling rubbish, I find Luisa Marcal (43), a midwife by training, who gave birth to her son in an empty hospital during the 1999 violence. All the medical staff and all the other patients had already fled. With her newborn in a laundry basket, she found shelter in the UN compound.

Now she works as a counsellor in a 'safe-house' for victims of domestic violence. "Years of war have ingrained violence as a way to deal with conflict", she says. It is an epidemic of which even the country’s leaders, who should set a good example, are guilty. 

There are no quick fix solutions to problem such as poverty, security and violence. It will take East Timor at least another decade or two to rise above the legacy left by years of war. But neither Mira nor Luisa regret their choice in 1999. After all they would rather be ruled by their own people than by the Indonesians.