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By the time Gusmao was finally released last October, he arrived home to the ruined buildings and shattered lives of the postindependence carnage. In his first speech in Dili, he had tears in his eyes as he told the crowd, "We knew we would suffer--but we are still here."
Gusmao now works in uneasy alliance with the U.N., which has been criticized by many Timorese for being hopelessly slow in delivering economic aid. There are many basic issues to settle in framing East Timor's independence, from which currency to use--it will be the U.S. dollar--to what the official language should be (English or Portuguese). Yet despite his overwhelming popularity, Gusmao says he does not want to be the nation's first President in the elections scheduled for mid-2001: "Our struggle was not for us, but for the young people. [A President] needs more capacity than I have." Most of his countrymen think Gusmao has plenty, and as they build a new country, they feel they need him more than ever.
--With reporting by Jason Tedjasukmana/Dili