1) Papua Border Now Enjoys Cashless Social Assistance
Tuesday, 09 May 2017 | 19:46 WIB
Social Affairs Minister Khofifah Indar Parawansa together with public in Papua (infopublik.id)
JAYAPURA, NETRALNEWS.COM - Social Assistance for Family Hope Program (PKH) which is channeled by way of cashless has now penetrated the border area of Papua. Minister of Social Affairs Khofifah Indar Parawansa says this is a manifestation of state presence in the equitable acceleration of handling poverty in Eastern Indonesia.
"As many as 22 districts and one city in Papua Province can now enjoy cashless PKH social assistance. This is the government's commitment in effort to equitable acceleration of handling of poverty in Eastern Indonesia, especially in Papua," said Social Minister when reviewing the disbursement process of cashless PKH in Muara Tami District in statement received by Netralnews.com from the Ministry of Religious Affairs (Kemenag), Tuesday (05/09/2017).
The PKH beneficiaries receive a savings book doubling as Family Welfare Card (KKS) which contains IDR2 million of social assistance to be disbursed four times a year.
KKS serves as an ATM debit card for PKH beneficiaries. The main advantage of KKS is that there are two systems that are embedded in it, namely saving function and also its function as e-Wallet. E-Wallet can be used to shop for basic needs of basic needs.
With these two functions, PKH social assistance beneficiaries can spend on social assistance funds or purchase basic needs or withdraw funds for social assistance in cash.
"Connected Papuans with banking makes it easier for them to access in obtaining social assistance, they can also save and withdraw cash sufficiently as needed using BNI and BRI services," said Social Minister who in various trips to the area always checks the process of disbursement of social aid either at ATM, agent of Banks, or tellers. (*)
2) Jokowi promises to continue development of border areas
4 hours ago | 337 Views
Jayapura, Papua (ANTARA News) - President Joko Widodo (Joko Widodo) said the government would not forget development in border area such as Skouw in Papua bordering on Papua New Guinea.
"On the day I was officially installed President I already said that frontier areas may not be forgotten as they stand in the forefront areas," the president said, adding area like Skouw should be a pride for the people of Papua and for all Indonesians.
Development in border areas must give positive effect on the people especially local people, he said. Development of border areas must create economic centers, he said.
The president asked the Public Works and Housing Minister to speed up development and modern market center in Skouw to be completed in 2019.
He said the prices of consumer goods in Port Moresby, Papua New Guinea are much more expensive than in Papua such as food and clothes and electronic goods.
"This is an opportunity for the people of Papua in trade with people from Papua New Guinea . Therefore, it is our duty to boost economic development on border areas," he said.
President Jokowi and the First Lady Iriana and Papua Governor Lukas Enembe and Vice Governor Klemen Tinal visited Skouw to commission a new border checkpoint in that area built Skouw since 2015. (*)
3) RSPO freezes palm oil company’s operations in Papua
7 May 2017 / Alice Cuddy
A stern action from the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil, which has not always enforced its standards for sustainable production of the commodity.
The RSPO ordered Goodhope Asia Holdings to stop work in seven of its concessions in Indonesia, citing "poor quality" audits commissioned by the company to ensure it follows RSPO rules.
High Conservation Value assessments for all seven of the concessions were conducted by a team of Bogor Agricultural University lecturers led by Nyoto Santoso. The assessments are being treated as suspect by the RSPO.
While Goodhope opposes the measures, they have been lauded by environmental NGOs as a positive step.
The world’s biggest sustainable palm oil association has frozen the operations of one of its most prominent members on concessions in Indonesia because of failures to meet its standards on new planting.
The Complaints Panel of the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO) issued a stop-work order for seven subsidiaries of Goodhope Asia Holdings as a result of “poor quality” audits and insufficient documentation required under its New Planting Procedure (NPP) rules.
The Singapore-based palm oil company, an arm of Sri Lanka’s Carson Cumberbatch, has been linked to various cases of environmental and human rights abuses in Indonesia, including allegations of grabbing land from an indigenous community in Papua province on the island of New Guinea, where the industry is quickly expanding.
The RSPO’s action comes just weeks after a group of leading environmental and indigenous rights NGOs hit out at the body for allowing a Goodhope subsidiary to post public notification of new planting plans, which they claimed were “incomplete, substandard, insufficient, and in places factually untrue.”
In a letter to Goodhope sustainability director Edi Suhardi, the RSPO Complaints Panel explained that an independent review had found that High Conservation Value (HCV) assessments conducted for its subsidiaries PT Nabire Baru and PT Agrajaya Baktitama were of a poor standard.
RSPO members must submit an HCV assessment prior to any establishment or expansion of a plantation, in order to identify areas that cannot be cleared — such as virgin rainforests — without violating the body’s standards for ethical palm oil production.
Issues with Goodhope’s HCV assessments included inadequate areas set aside to protect HCV areas and failure to identify how the company had negotiated with local communities to use their land.
The RSPO’s letter also noted that key Land Use Change Analysis (LUCA) documentation, identifying areas converted from forest to palm, was missing.
The northern cassowary is one of the birds-of-paradise for which Papua’s forests are famous. Companies that join the RSPO are prohibited from clearing pristine rainforests, but many of them do it anyway, thanks in part to shoddy work by auditors responsible for demarcating no-go areas. Photo by Rhett A. Butler for Mongabay.
RSPO communications chief Stefano Savi said the action against the seven Goodhope subsidiaries was a “precautionary measure” taken largely because all of the HCV assessments were conducted by the same auditor — a team of Bogor Agricultural University lecturers led by Nyoto Santoso, whose audits have been repeatedly flagged as filled with misleading claims.
In its letter, the RSPO set out deadlines for the Goodhope subsidiaries to redo their HCV assessments and complete the necessary LUCA to comply with the body’s rules.
It warned that any deviation from this timeline would “be viewed severely and may lead to suspension and eventual termination of membership.”
But Goodhope’s Suhardi maintained this week that the action was unwarranted.
“We disagree on the opinion that the HCV assessments were of poor quality. Such rating was not based on objective criteria and clear indicators,” he told Mongabay by email.
“There is no reason for (the) RSPO to demand new Land Use Change Analysis since the assessments were done prior to land development,” he added.
According to Suhardi, the issues stem from delays by the RSPO Secretariat in reviewing Goodhope’s NPP submissions, which he said has resulted in new standards being applied retroactively.
He said Goodhope was seeking clarification from the RSPO on the reasons for the action.
Shortly after the RSPO issued the stop-work order, Suhardi released a statement announcing the temporary self-suspension of the Indonesian Growers’ Caucus from the multistakeholder body, which he described as a “lame duck” target of criticism.
He retracted the statement the following day, but said he had temporarily suspended himself from all positions within the RSPO “due to alleged conflict of interest.”
Such allegations of impartiality have focused largely on Suhardi’s role as vice president of the RSPO; a position he claims not to have occupied since 2015, but which Savi this week said he still holds pending his temporary self-suspension.
Savi said the RSPO Secretariat was yet to hear a response from Goodhope about the demands for resubmissions and reassessments, but reiterated that failure to meet the deadlines could lead to the company’s membership being terminated.
An oil palm plantation on Indonesia’s main western island of Sumatra. Photo by Rhett A. Butler for Mongabay.
While Goodhope opposes the measures, they have been lauded by environmental NGOs as a positive step.
“This is the kind of action we would expect from an organization serious about upholding its own standard and procedures,” said Environmental Investigation Agency (EIA) forest campaigner Audrey Versteegen.
“To be credible, it is the right and only action the RSPO Secretariat could take when one of its members is found to act in clear breach of several of the requirements of its membership.”
Annisa Rahmawati, senior forest campaigner at Greenpeace Southeast Asia, agreed.
“After sitting on its hands for months, the RSPO has finally confirmed Goodhope’s operations are rotten to the core,” she said.
She added that the RSPO’s action should be a “wake-up call” to Goodhope’s customers, including leading palm oil refiner Wilmar International, which had been “far too complacent.”
In a statement to Mongabay, Singapore-based Wilmar said the issues raised over Goodhope were not in direct violation of its own sustainable sourcing policies, but had raised the possibility “that we may need to review the way we assess future HCV assessments.”
The company said it was awaiting the outcome of discussions between the two sides, but encouraged Goodhope to “continue its engagement with the RSPO and resolve the issues within the RSPO procedure.”
The other Goodhope units subject to the stop-work order are PT Sariwana Adi Perkasa, PT Batu Mas Sejahtera, PT Sawit Makmur Sejahtera, PT Sinar Sawit Andalan and PT Sumber Hasil Prima.
How does living under the occupation affect the lives of ordinary West Papuans? Indonesian human rights lawyer Veronica Koman spoke to five current residents of West Papua to hear their stories.
Rosa Moiwend is an independent researcher on social movements and self-determination, and also a political activist. She lives in Jayapura, the largest city in West Papua.
Living in West Papua means there is always something going on which reminds us of the occupation. We see discrimination, racism and violence before our eyes every day. My grandparents experienced the Trikora [the military invasion by Indonesia in 1961]. At that time, my family was living in Ninati village in the south. Most of the family had to flee across the border to Papua New Guinea – only my grandfather stayed behind. Our old village has now been inhabited by other tribes, and we have lost contact with all of the family that crossed the border. That’s the biggest personal loss to our family.
Many forms of daily discrimination have become normal in West Papua. The Indonesian occupation is not just about occupying territory, but also about changing our mindsets, how West Papuans see themselves. We are taught false things at school, particularly about our history. It’s a kind of mental slavery: Indonesian teachings and doctrines tell us ‘because we are West Papuans, we deserve to be treated unfairly’, and we start unconsciously to accept this.
The manipulation of our identity by the Indonesian government is very dangerous because we are transformed from our core. We really feel like our identities are being transformed to be like the Indonesians. Our standards are being changed to Indonesian standards.
I have experienced this first hand. I used to read the afternoon news at a local TV show. I used to have small dreadlocks. The producer asked me to change my hair. He told me to lose the dreadlocks and straighten my hair so it looked ‘neater’, according to the national TV standard. I argued. ‘Papua Lens’, the name of the show, should have shown how Papua was, but they wanted to change me. They then transferred me to an off-camera role, and I quit. I still have my dreadlocks today.
On 16 March 2006 in Jayapura, everyone who had dreadlocks was arrested and their hair was cut. This continued for a fortnight. During that time, a lot of indigenous people cut their hair. I didn’t want to do this, so I hid for quite a while and did not go home. It was not just about hair. We have dreadlocks not because we like reggae or Rasta, but as an ideology. Dreadlocks are my identity. A lot of my friends with dreadlocks feel the same. Dreadlocks have become a symbol of resistance and of a free West Papua, a challenge to what we were taught by the Indonesian state.
As a schoolchild, when I saw other people had straight hair, I dreamt of having long and straight hair. We all did. Even our toys referred to other people’s identity. It’s the same thing with beauty products – at the store, there is no powder which matches our skin colour.
Fortunately, the resistance is very strong and popular now. There are many t-shirts which say ‘I am Papua, curly hair and dark skin’, which are getting popular among the youth in many cities. But as long as the occupation is still happening, the repression of our identity will continue. What we get at school will shape our characters. So it depends on the parents to teach their children: about who they are, their identities as West Papuans. If the parents do not do that, it could be dangerous, because then when West Papua is finally free, the generation taking control would be this colonial-minded generation. We would then have to work hard again to fight our own people. So this liberation movement is not only about physical resistance but also about resisting this mindset.
West Papua will be free; it is only a matter of time. When I was little, we heard our parents whispering when they talked about politics – they had to keep it inside the house. Now, it is more open and we can see it even in mainstream media. That is the result of the collective work of many different people.
Women have always been involved in this movement, but they have often taken different roles from the men. West Papuan men often see these roles as less important or less heroic. This is not true, especially because women do play important leadership roles, and take to the streets actively when there are protests. Mama Yosepha [Yosepha Alomang, winner of the 2001 Goldman Environmental Prize], a villager who did not even attend school, organized women to blockade the airport and the Freeport mine – no men thought of that.
Things are changing now. The movement is more open and advanced, women are taking on more and different roles. This is a national struggle, the responsibility of both men and women. All generations have to work hand in hand.
Hana Yeimo
Hana Yeimo is a sweet-potato farmer in Enarotali, a town in Paniai province, central West Papua. On 8 December 2014, four local teenagers were shot dead by security forces near her home while protesting against the beating of schoolchildren by soldiers the previous day.
I am married and have an 11-year-old child. On a normal day, other than farming, I usually play cards with my friends.
Police and military watch us all the time. Especially the military, who will shoot at us randomly and out of nowhere.
It was around nine in the morning when I heard gunshots coming from the direction of the fields. So I went out to check. The police and the military were shooting at my people. So I stood in between the security forces and my people. The security forces ordered me to go away and said ‘you could get shot’. I shouted back at them that I did not care, just go ahead and shoot me. They shot my people before my eyes. I threw things and almost hit a local official. My relatives told me not to act like that, in order not to be arrested. But I did not care, I just wanted them to go. I screamed at them to let us be free and independent, rather than being shot and killed out of nowhere. I screamed until I lost my voice that day.
On that field, children died because the military shot them. Many others were wounded. I helped the people who were shot into a car. My cousin was also a victim. I know all the other victims. The victims do not want to talk about the case any more. They are tired of repeating the same story without any result.
Max Binur is an artist and cultural activist living in the northwest port city of Sorong.
I love arts and I am a humanist. My daily activities usually involve discussions with indigenous people in both towns and villages. We talk about environmental destruction and how to use local wisdom and culture as weapons against injustice. We paint and make sculptures and other artworks.
I am the founder of Belantara Papua, an organization for empowering indigenous people. We do environmental advocacy, monitoring and investigation with indigenous people who are impacted by the presence of palm-oil, mining and illegal logging companies. I also support indigenous people to use our culture in our struggle. Demonstrations will not solve the problem any more, the government is already numb. So I use culture as a fighting tool.
I also empower children in villages who face difficulties in education, and help them to create schools in areas that lack them. We teach them how to build a school, or if that isn’t possible, how to build an art centre. I also encourage them to dance, craft and sculpt at the art centres. We are fighting the violence in West Papua through culture.
I first saw the violence of the Indonesian military when I was four years old. I used to live in Biak with my family. My father had been a police officer since the Dutch era. I grew up in a police environment. When I was a small kid, my head was hit with a rifle butt by the police. It made me gradually realize that state violence is very real. When I was at university in the 1990s, the Free West Papua movement was rising. I took part in big rallies. And finally when I worked at an NGO in Jayapura, I became very aware of human rights violations. It transformed my perspective and my commitment to work for West Papua and its people.
I am very sure that we will be free, sooner or later. Either I or my children will enjoy such freedom. I am very certain.
Here’s what we need from the rest of the world. First, help us publicize the human rights violations in West Papua. Second, pressure the Indonesian government to decrease the military violence in West Papua. Third, call for a replacement for the sham 1969 independence referendum, because that is the root cause of the problem in West Papua. Finally, help us voice our concerns in UN forums.
Filep Karma
Filep Karma is a civil servant in Jayapura.
I work at the office every day. But I usually ask for permission to leave the office when there are demonstrations like the ones organized by KNPB [West Papua National Committee]. People at the office understand my involvement in the movement so they are not surprised any more.
West Papuans are being pushed into dependency on the Indonesian government. The government keeps expanding into West Papua, so more and more West Papuans are being recruited as civil servants. Civil servants are bound by government regulations. But I refuse to obey such regulations, I do not care. Being sacked is the risk I take for my activism. Although according to the UN, everyone has the right to work – so as long as there is no violence in my activism, I should not be sacked.
Repression happens systematically everywhere across West Papua, and is getting worse. For example, we are not allowed to protest. Protest is a human right, but that is not the case in West Papua. Why can’t we raise the West Papuan flag? It should be allowed in a democracy. I am an optimist and am very sure that West Papua will one day be free.
In Biak in 1998, I was part of a peaceful action where we raised the West Papua flag from 2-6 July. The government invited me for negotiation at the parliament building. I refused the invitation; I wanted to be with the people on the ground. We were unarmed, but were rounded up by the police and the military. Instead of just arresting people, the military started shooting. Usually people get shot when they try to run away. I did not run away, I deliberately lay down and some other protesters did the same. The military threw rocks at those of us who were lying down – some of them stood up and were then shot. This was the Biak city massacre of 6 July 1998. The violence spread across the city, there was rape and mutilation of unarmed women and men. I was arrested, convicted and the district court sentenced me to six and half years, but this was later overturned by the president as part of a wider amnesty for political prisoners.
I was arrested again on 1 December 2004. All I did was protest peacefully. I had given a protest notification letter to the police as required by the law. People who raised the Morning Star flag during the protest, including me and Yusak Pakage, were arrested. Comrades held a rally demanding our release but we were ill-treated instead. I was sentenced to 15 years. On 19 December 2015, I was suddenly taken out of jail, without any clear legal procedure.
I think the right strategy is to fight peacefully and build international sympathy. We hope that the rest of the world will call on the UN to oversee an independence referendum for the West Papuan people. It would be even better if the UN acknowledged our right to be independent straight away and admitted that they made a mistake with the 1969 sham referendum. Also, why did they only include voters from inside West Papua? There were West Papuans in the Netherlands and elsewhere at that time. The next independence referendum should give West Papuans everywhere the right to vote.
Elizabeth Ndiwaen
Elizabeth Ndiwaen lives in the city of Merauke, in the southeast of the country, near the Merauke Integrated Food and Energy Estate (MIFEE) – a major Indonesian project including palm-oil plantations and industrial agriculture, which is planned to replace 1.2 million hectares of rainforest.
I am 34 years old. I am married with four children. My eldest daughter is a teacher, my second child just graduated senior high school, my third child is in junior high school, and my youngest is still in kindergarten. I maintain the home, and I sometimes work with the National Human Rights Commission and Pusaka Foundation on environmental and indigenous people’s issues.
Here in Merauke, we really feel the occupation. We are often oppressed, beaten and threatened. On top of that, there are 42 companies including MIFEE operating in Merauke. Every company has its own special-force police and military protecting the company. They often intimidate village people.
Before MIFEE began, we were poor but we were happy living on our own land. We used to just enter the forest to look for food when we wanted to eat. But when MIFEE came, they destroyed our forests. Our life became difficult. All of our rivers are too polluted to use any more. There is no support from the government towards our future.
I wish that MIFEE would stop operating here. We are planning to hold a meeting with people from 14 local regions about MIFEE this August.
West Papua will one day be free. West Papuans talk about this publicly now; we do not want to talk about it secretly any more. To all governments and people out there, I would like to say clearly that we do not want to be oppressed any more. We need justice.
Veronica Koman is a public interest lawyer at the Jakarta Legal Aid Institute (LBH Jakarta). She provides legal representation for many West Papuans arrested for political activities.
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Clockwise from top left: Papuan and Indonesian students from People's Solidarity for Democracy (SORAK) create a street performance for West Papuan human rights in Bandung, West Papua, December 2016, photo by by Whens Tebay. Indonesian police at a West Papuan freedom rally, 2016, photo by Whens Tebay. A busy highway in Jayapura. Two-thirds of the city's population is now non-Papuan, photo by Koroi Hawkins. A West Papuan villager in the highlands, photo by Clare Harding. ©
Living in West Papua means there is always something going on which reminds us of the occupation. We see discrimination, racism and violence before our eyes every day. My grandparents experienced the Trikora [the military invasion by Indonesia in 1961]. At that time, my family was living in Ninati village in the south. Most of the family had to flee across the border to Papua New Guinea – only my grandfather stayed behind. Our old village has now been inhabited by other tribes, and we have lost contact with all of the family that crossed the border. That’s the biggest personal loss to our family.
Many forms of daily discrimination have become normal in West Papua. The Indonesian occupation is not just about occupying territory, but also about changing our mindsets, how West Papuans see themselves. We are taught false things at school, particularly about our history. It’s a kind of mental slavery: Indonesian teachings and doctrines tell us ‘because we are West Papuans, we deserve to be treated unfairly’, and we start unconsciously to accept this.
The manipulation of our identity by the Indonesian government is very dangerous because we are transformed from our core. We really feel like our identities are being transformed to be like the Indonesians. Our standards are being changed to Indonesian standards.
I have experienced this first hand. I used to read the afternoon news at a local TV show. I used to have small dreadlocks. The producer asked me to change my hair. He told me to lose the dreadlocks and straighten my hair so it looked ‘neater’, according to the national TV standard. I argued. ‘Papua Lens’, the name of the show, should have shown how Papua was, but they wanted to change me. They then transferred me to an off-camera role, and I quit. I still have my dreadlocks today.
On 16 March 2006 in Jayapura, everyone who had dreadlocks was arrested and their hair was cut. This continued for a fortnight. During that time, a lot of indigenous people cut their hair. I didn’t want to do this, so I hid for quite a while and did not go home. It was not just about hair. We have dreadlocks not because we like reggae or Rasta, but as an ideology. Dreadlocks are my identity. A lot of my friends with dreadlocks feel the same. Dreadlocks have become a symbol of resistance and of a free West Papua, a challenge to what we were taught by the Indonesian state.
As a schoolchild, when I saw other people had straight hair, I dreamt of having long and straight hair. We all did. Even our toys referred to other people’s identity. It’s the same thing with beauty products – at the store, there is no powder which matches our skin colour.
Fortunately, the resistance is very strong and popular now. There are many t-shirts which say ‘I am Papua, curly hair and dark skin’, which are getting popular among the youth in many cities. But as long as the occupation is still happening, the repression of our identity will continue. What we get at school will shape our characters. So it depends on the parents to teach their children: about who they are, their identities as West Papuans. If the parents do not do that, it could be dangerous, because then when West Papua is finally free, the generation taking control would be this colonial-minded generation. We would then have to work hard again to fight our own people. So this liberation movement is not only about physical resistance but also about resisting this mindset.
West Papua will be free; it is only a matter of time. When I was little, we heard our parents whispering when they talked about politics – they had to keep it inside the house. Now, it is more open and we can see it even in mainstream media. That is the result of the collective work of many different people.
Women have always been involved in this movement, but they have often taken different roles from the men. West Papuan men often see these roles as less important or less heroic. This is not true, especially because women do play important leadership roles, and take to the streets actively when there are protests. Mama Yosepha [Yosepha Alomang, winner of the 2001 Goldman Environmental Prize], a villager who did not even attend school, organized women to blockade the airport and the Freeport mine – no men thought of that.
Things are changing now. The movement is more open and advanced, women are taking on more and different roles. This is a national struggle, the responsibility of both men and women. All generations have to work hand in hand.
I love arts and I am a humanist. My daily activities usually involve discussions with indigenous people in both towns and villages. We talk about environmental destruction and how to use local wisdom and culture as weapons against injustice. We paint and make sculptures and other artworks.
I am the founder of Belantara Papua, an organization for empowering indigenous people. We do environmental advocacy, monitoring and investigation with indigenous people who are impacted by the presence of palm-oil, mining and illegal logging companies. I also support indigenous people to use our culture in our struggle. Demonstrations will not solve the problem any more, the government is already numb. So I use culture as a fighting tool.
I also empower children in villages who face difficulties in education, and help them to create schools in areas that lack them. We teach them how to build a school, or if that isn’t possible, how to build an art centre. I also encourage them to dance, craft and sculpt at the art centres. We are fighting the violence in West Papua through culture.
I first saw the violence of the Indonesian military when I was four years old. I used to live in Biak with my family. My father had been a police officer since the Dutch era. I grew up in a police environment. When I was a small kid, my head was hit with a rifle butt by the police. It made me gradually realize that state violence is very real. When I was at university in the 1990s, the Free West Papua movement was rising. I took part in big rallies. And finally when I worked at an NGO in Jayapura, I became very aware of human rights violations. It transformed my perspective and my commitment to work for West Papua and its people.
I am very sure that we will be free, sooner or later. Either I or my children will enjoy such freedom. I am very certain.
Here’s what we need from the rest of the world. First, help us publicize the human rights violations in West Papua. Second, pressure the Indonesian government to decrease the military violence in West Papua. Third, call for a replacement for the sham 1969 independence referendum, because that is the root cause of the problem in West Papua. Finally, help us voice our concerns in UN forums.
I love arts and I am a humanist. My daily activities usually involve discussions with indigenous people in both towns and villages. We talk about environmental destruction and how to use local wisdom and culture as weapons against injustice. We paint and make sculptures and other artworks.
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