Tag: Papua

Papuan students demonstrate outside UNCEN, Jayapura

Bintang Papua, 30 June 2011
An announcement on Thursday about the selection of students at the
state university led to a demonstration being held by students who also
blocked off the Cenderawasih university campus in Waena. The entry to
the campus was blocked off while a small bonfire was burning in the
middles of the road. The demo was organised by the chairman of the
Students Association of Tolikara, supported by students of the faculty
of law at the university.

Speeches were made and leaflets were stuck on the walls, with demands to
the rector of the university.

One of the leaflets said: ‘Why is it that year after year, indigenous
Papuans account for less than 20 percent of the total while the other 80
percent are non-Papuans?

‘We are asking the rector to account for this, bearing in mind an
earlier promise that Papuans would account for 80 percent,’ said Terius
Wakor, co-ordinator of the action. This was a promise made by the rector
of UNCEN, Prof Dr B Kambuya.

‘We indigenous Papuan students feel very disappointed about this
because the rector promised that priority would be given to indigenous
Papuans with 80 percent of the places. Yet what has happened is that
only 5 percent of the Papuans were accepted into the university.’

Another of the students, Thomas CH Syufi, who also took part in the
demo, said: ‘We as representatives of the Executive Board of the
Students, the BEM of the Faculty of Law, strongly support the views of
our colleagues.’

Following the announcement about the students who were selected, he said
that they hoped that the rector would take account of the views of the
indigenous Papuan students, in view of what the rector promised last
year. ‘We very much hope that the rector will take some action with
regard to the Papuan students who did not pass the selection test. He
suggested that there should be another round of testing for a second
group of students to be accepted to the university.

Meanwhile the deputy rector said that while no promises had been made,
there had been a commitment to increase the percentage of indigenous
Papuan students. He said that at this level (the SNMPTN), it was
difficult to have an effect on the selection of students. He told
Bintang Papua that not enough Papuans were available from the IPS, and
very few had registered with the IPA programme.

[Apologies for not knowing what these initials stand for. TAPOL]

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Buchtar: Some Papuan political prisoners dont receive enough attention

 

Wednesday 22 June 2011

<http://www.aldepe.com/2011/06/buchtar-tapol-papua-kurang-diperhatikan.html&gt;

ALDP

 

Buchtar Tabuni, a Papuan political prisoner now being held in Jayapura, has complained that some Papuan political prisoners are not being given enough attention by NGOs and religious organisations. They are focusing most of their attention on particular political prisoners while others are being neglected.

‘ The NGOs have so far failed to give proper attention to some of us political prisoners, while paying attention to certain prisoners, in partiulcar’ said Buchtar Tabuni. He expressed this opinion on Monday, 20 June at the Narcotics Prison in Doyo Baru, Sentani, Jayapura, where he is being held.

‘Sometimes they pay us no attention at all, even though we are also political prisoners, he said. ‘

‘This is happening not only in Jayapura but also elsewhere in Papua.  Almost all our colleagues have the same experience., he said.   He thought that this problem should be discussed to ensure that NGOs and religious organisations play a role in all this.

He said that he regretted the attitude of the NGOs.   Local as well as international NGOs are doing a lot of campaigning about convicted prisoners and political prisoners in Papua but they are not paying enough attention to most of us.’   Buchtar himself is apparently quite unwell and is suffering from malaria.

He said that he hoped that more attention would be paid to all the convicted prisoners (napi) as well as all the political prisoners, including not only those in Jayapura but elsewhere in Papua too.   ‘We should all get proper attention,’ he said.  (ALDP)

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More capital assistance for Papuan women, officials promise

Financial help to Papuan businesswomen seriously lacking

The press in Papua has recently reported extensively on the allocation
of OTSUS funds to assist Papuans in their business operations, in
particular Papuan women referred to as ‘mama-mama’

On 11 June 2011, the JUBI tabloid newspaper reported that most of the
allocation of OTSUS funds is concentrated on public infrastructure and
government assets but insufficient attention is being paid to local
Papuan traders, including ‘mama-mama.’ The problem was raised in
particular by the head of the Oadate Major Clan, in the district of
Yapen-Waropen, Yulinus Kowela.

He said that OTSUS funds were being allocated almost entirely to
government officials, the government elite, as he called them.
‘Meanwhile, local Papuan traders and indigenous Papuan women continue to
be impoverished and on the margins, because of the nature of the
development according to OTSUS,’ said Yulinus.

‘For many years, we have been saying that OTSUS funds should be used to
combat poverty and improve the living conditions of indigenous Papuans.
But up to the present day, this hasn’t happened, people are asking about
this, including people living in the interior.’

He said that the allocaton of OTSUS funds should take account of the
fate of indigenous Papuan traders and not just focus on building
infrastructure such as road-building and building bridges in all the
districts. ‘The allocation of OTSIS money should be fairer and be used
to improve the conditions of women traders. They need help to be able to
obtain better facilities for their business activities,’ he said.

On 22 June, JUBI reported that the district chief of Merauke, Romanus
Mbaraka spoke of the need to pay attention to the little people and pay
greater attention to their need for capital. He said that the government
was planning to provide capital to groups of businesses, amounting to Rp
500,000 for each group.

At a ceremony in Gedung Negara, he symbolically handed over the money to
one group of traders. He said that the money was being allocated to
groups of businesses because past experience had shown that this was
better than allocating it to individuals. ‘In this way,’ he said, ‘the
monitoring process can be more easily managed.’

He said that the money was not being allocated for free but the groups
would be expected to repay the money but in this way, the groups would
have greater motivation to run their businesses well.’

‘If a business is successful, its earnings will increase, which means
that the government will be willing to help them again. He also said
that teams will be set up to monitor the businesses run by the women
such as those selling crabs or vegetables. This would motivate the
mama-mama to run their businesses well,’ he said.

[COMMENT: It remains to be seen whether this grand promise will bear
fruit in terms of promoting the economic interests of indigenous Papuans
in their never-ending difficulties to compete with the business acumen
of the thousands of Indonesians who flood into Papua and set up
businesses. TAPOL]

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WHAT DO WE KNOW ABOUT HOW MUCH FREEPORT PRODUCES?

JUBI, 22 June, 2011
It is still very difficult for the Mimika district administration to get information about the quantity of gold and copper produced by Freeport-Indonesia and how much is exported via Portsite, Amamapare.
Freeport's Grasberg mine - Earth's biggest hole in the ground

The head  of the mining, energy and minerals department of the Mimika administration, said:

‘We don’t know anything about the quantity of gold, copper and other minerals produced daily by Freeport and this is because  we do not have free access to the company to be able to control the level of production every day.’

He said that the administration did once charge two of its employees to oversee export activity in Amamapare, but after we had given them the task, the two men were unfortunately shifted other posts.’  [Could this have been a deliberate action.]

This is a big problem. Anyone charged with scrutinising exports and imports  would have to be a specialist. They would need to have a special certificate for controlling goods and services for both exports and imports..

All this has an impact on obtaining clarification about the quantity of minerals produced every year. How can this possibly be synchronised with the information received by the authorities in Jakarta? It’s all just a game because the people at the centre get data about gold and copper production which comes directly from the company, PTFI.

The department of mines in Jakarta only gets information from one side. ‘This doesn’t lead to any accuracy. Anyone with bad intentions can easily manipulate the data.  Although lots of stuff is exported, they report a very low figure.’

So the question is: who else but the company can know anything about the quantity of material it produces every year? Only the PTFI.

[COMMENT: This once again highlights the extraordinary powers that the US company has been given to keep a tight control over how much it exploits of Papua’s abundant natural resources, with the  Papuan people not only left in the dark but also left living in poverty while Freeport makes a fortune from its investments in West Papua. TAPOL]

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Bomb planted outside Law and Human Rights office, no suspects

Westpapuamedia.info

Local media and witnesses in Abepura, near Jayapura West Papua, have reported the discovery of an explosive device planted on Wednesday evening (local time) outside the offices of the Department of Law and Human Rights (KumHAM) office in Kotaraja.

Armed officers from Brimob Gegana, a specialised motorbike based paramilitary bomb squad, reportedly defused and secured the bomb and made it safe.  No injuries were reported.

The bomb had been lying at the front of the office all day, but no-one had thought to report the suspicious package.  Finally in the evening, the Brimob were called by KumHAM staff members.

According to a report by Bintang Papua, two men were seen leaving the sports bag earlier in the day, and then getting on a motorbike and speeding away.

The Department has frequently come under threat for its mandated work in occasional prosecutions of human rights abuses, and most recently was subject to a series of threatening letters and homemade bombs.

According to an SMS sent to West Papua Media by the Serui Regional Police Chief who was in Jayapura at the time (At police HQ), the bomb “was from the Dutch era”.  He did not elaborate on how a Dutch Era bomb came to be planted outside the KumHAM  building.

Bomb threats are frequently the subject of much speculation in Papua, with incidents usually occuring during times of political upheaval by nonviolence forces.  It is usually believed they are the work of Special Forces or Intelligence agencies keen to discredit the anti-violence movement, despite the fact that the independence movement has publicly disavowed itself of such tactics for many years.

During the 2010 Presidential Elections in Indonesia, many bombs exploded in remote areas of Papua, or at police stations or polling booths, and were never sufficiently investigated by Police.

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