Wednesday, March 28, 2018

1) Thousands without e-ID may not be able to vote in Papua


2) Places to Watch: 3 Forest Regions at Risk Right Now

3) Compromise yields New Caledonia referendum question
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1) Thousands without e-ID may not be able to vote in Papua
Nethy Dharma Somba The Jakarta Post
Jayapura, Papua | Wed, March 28, 2018 | 05:56 pm


Thousands of voters in Papua have yet to have their identities registered under the electronic identification (e-ID), which could strip them of their voting rights in the upcoming elections.
Acting Papua Governor Sudarmo said he had instructed the Papua Social Affairs and Civil Registry Agency to speed up the e-ID registration of 627,815 voters. He also said the residents must be provided with a statement letter if the agency had not yet acquired the blank cards for the new e-ID.
“The voters who don’t own an e-ID or a statement letter [regarding their identities] cannot use their voting rights in the 2018 regional elections and the 2019 legislative and presidential elections,” Sudarmo said on Wednesday.
The Papua General Election Commission (KPUD) has said the temporary voters list for the province included 3,580,279 people.
Civil registry agency head Ribka Haluk said the officials have faced challenges in recording residents’ data after equipment was destroyed during conflict and resistance from the residents.
“There are voters across all regencies in Papua that have yet to have their data recorded. They are mostly in the Jayawijaya, Paniai and Lanny Jaya regencies,” Ribka said.
Meanwhile, Papua Elections Supervisory Body (Bawaslu) member Pata said authorities found out about the issue following coklit— a campaign by the KPU for voter data verification.
“We found that there are residents who do not have registered identification yet. That is unfortunate as they cannot vote in the upcoming elections,” Pata said.
The provincial administration has only three weeks left to record the residents' data as the KPUD will hold a plenary meeting to announce the final voters list.
Suparmo added if the administration could not register a significant number of people he would consult with related parties on special policies needed to make sure residents can still use their voting rights.
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2) Places to Watch: 3 Forest Regions at Risk Right Now

By Mikaela Weisse and Katie Fletcher
This edition of Places to Watch examines forest clearing detected between Nov. 9, 2017, and Jan. 31, 2018 in Indonesian Papua, Cameroon and Brazil. Due to occasional cloud cover that can obscure satellite recognition, some loss may have occurred earlier.
Oil Palm Plantation Encroaching on Primary Forest in Indonesian Papua

Oil palm stretches out to the horizon in what was previously primary forest in the PT Bio Inti Agrindo concession, owned by POSCO Daewoo. Photo credit: Mighty.
Fears that the forests of Indonesian Papua would be the next frontier for oil palm expansion are coming true, according to new satellite imagery analysis. Papua is home to more than a third of Indonesia's remaining intact forest and experienced unprecedented tree cover loss in 2015 and 2016. GLAD alerts since November show further forest clearing, most likely for oil palm.
According to a report by the NGO awasMIFEE!, various Indonesian government agencies have actively promoted large scale-agricultural investment in southern Papua. This has resulted in several new oil palm projects, including investment in the PT Bio Inti Agrindo (PT BIA) concession highlighted in the previous edition of Places to Watch. PT BIA Block II has resulted in more than 20,000 hectares (49,500 acres) of tree cover loss since 2013, most of it in primary forest, with around 2,300 hectares (5,580 acres) affected since November, according to GLAD alerts.

However, this loss of primary forest has sparked opposition. Norway's central bank divested from PT BIA owner POSCO Daewoo in 2015 over deforestation concerns in the concession and in June 2017, Mighty Earth sent out a letter warning palm oil buyers that purchases from POSCO Daewoo would violate their No Deforestation and RSPO (Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil) commitments. More than 20 companies including Clorox, Colgate Palmolive, IKEA, L'Oreal, Mars and Unilever have said they will exclude POSCO Daewoo from their supply chains. In December, Boots, the UK's largest drugstore retailer, dropped its retail partnership with POSCO Daewoo. In response to this pressure, POSCO Daewoo reportedly instated a temporary moratorium on new clearing, and since the start of 2018, there have been less than 10 hectares (25 acres) of GLAD alerts detected within the concession.
GLAD alerts also detected thousands of hectares of recent clearing in Papua within PT Agrinusa Persada Mulia, a subsidiary of the Ganda Group, and PT Central Cipta Persada oil palm concessions…………...
3) Compromise yields New Caledonia referendum question
2:35 pm on 28 March 2018 
The question for this November's independence referendum in New Caledonia has been agreed to in talks with the French prime minister.
Voters will be asked: "Do you want New Caledonia to accede to full sovereignty and become independent?"
The prime minister Edouard Philippe made the announcement in Paris after extended discussions with the signatories to the Noumea Accord which lasted until after midnight.
He said the wording is a compromise accommodating the wish of the pro-independence camp to include the term sovereignty.
The anti-independence camp wanted the question to include whether voters wanted to stay French.
The vote on 4 November will be restricted to long-term residents under a recently amended law.
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