An Indonesian minister within Prabowo Subianto's new government took little time to announce plans to resume a former transmigration program throughout the eastern regions of a sovereign Indonesia, including the largest Papua province in western New Guinea, saying it was needed to enhance unity and provide locals with welfare.
Transmigration is the controversial process of forcibly moving Indigenous people on from their existing residences in a densely populated part of Indonesia to less densely populated areas of the country.
But for Indigenous Papuans that have a cultural connection and far more in common with their brothers in Papua New Guinea, displacement of Papuan populations remain a historical sore point.
The ministry intends to revitalise 10 zones in Papua, potentially using local relocation rather than bringing in outsiders and/or foreigners for work.
The program had been on pause for 23 years after it was found to severely propagate and to accelerate the Papuan independence movement in the western half of the New Guinea that has been under Indonesian control since October 1962 following the exodus of Dutch colonists.
"We want Papua to be fully united, as a part of Indonesia in terms of welfare, national unity and beyond," Muhammad Iftitah Sulaiman Suryanagara, the revived minister of transmigration, said.
Mr Iftitah has promised strict evaluations focusing on community welfare rather than just relocation numbers.
Despite the minister's promises, the plan has since drew outcry from Indigenous Papuans, citing social and economic concerns.
The purpose of this program was officially to reduce poverty and to provide opportunities for hard-working poor people by providing a workforce to utilise natural resources of the nation.
But in Papua, a remote and resource-rich region, it is viewed as a form of indentured labour.
The program has been a flashpoint for conflict, with its people enduring decades of alleged military abuse and human rights violations under Indonesian rule.
Simon Balagaize, a young Papuan leader from Merauke, highlighted the negative impacts of transmigration efforts in Papua under dictator Suharto's New Order during the 1960s.
"Customary land was taken, forests were cut down, (while) the indigenous Malind people now speak Javanese better than their native language," he told the independent Southeast Asian, BenarNews, last month.
The Papuan Church Council stressed locals desperately do require increased services, but could do without more transmigration
"Papuans need education, health services and welfare – not transmigration that only further marginalizes landowners," Rev Dorman Wandikbo, a council member, told BenarNews.
Transmigration into Papua has sparked protests on concerns about reduced employment opportunities for Indigenous people.
Human rights advocate Theo Hasegem criticised the government's step back, arguing the human rights issues are ignored under transmigration, and non-Papuans could also be endangered because separatist groups often target newcomers.
"Do the president and vice president guarantee the safety of those relocated from Java?" Hasegem told BenarNews.
The program dates to 1905 during the Dutch East Indies administration and was a program an independent Indonesia adopted and continued through a number of its administrations under the guise of promoting development and unity.
It also aimed to promote social and cultural unity by relocating citizens across regions.
Transmigration involved 78,000 families in Papua from 1964 to 1999, according to statistics from the Papua provincial government.
The program only had paused in 2001 after a special Indonesian autonomy law required regional regulations to be followed.
A Papuan legislator, John N R Gobay, questioned the role of Papua's latest autonomous regional governments for the transmigration process.
He cited an article of the law mandating that transmigration proceeds only with gubernatorial consent and regulatory backing.
Without clear regional regulations, he warned, transmigration lacks a strong legal foundation and could conflict with special autonomy rules that exist in Western New Guinean provinces.
United Nations data estimates between 60,000 and 100,000 Papuans have been displaced since 2022, after Indonesia denies UN officials access to the region, while human rights advocates in the area recently said the figure is 79,000.
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