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The Jakarta Post
Tuesday, November 1, 2011
Managing Papua with Heart
By Hafid Abbas, Jakarta
In his State of the Nation address on Aug. 16, 2011, President Susilo
Bambang Yudhoyono underlined the importance of addressing the
complicated problems facing Papua.
He reiterated that the government had established its policy to ensure
that development in the easternmost territory could really lead to
just, secure, peaceful and prosperous lives for the people there.
In the political sphere, through special autonomy, the central
government has given greater authority to the local government to
carry out development according to its resources. During the last five
years, the central government also went through substantial fiscal
decentralization to directly support the acceleration of development
in Papua. Papua is also one of the economic corridors in the Master
Plan of Economic Development Acceleration and Expansion of Indonesia.
Papuan management with a heart is therefore the key to all the steps
to achieve successful development of the eastern gate of Indonesia.
The President’s remarks appear to be the mantra to addressing the
complexity of socioeconomic and political problems in Papua.
Ironically, the last few weeks saw continuing social tensions prevail
in Papua. The tension began after Aug. 2, 2011, when about 1,000
people in Jayapura took to the streets to show their support for a
conference of
International Lawyers for West Papua (ILWP) in London, who were
pursuing a referendum for the independence in Papua.
The latest shock came when the third Papuan People’s Congress was held
in Abepura district in Jayapura on Oct. 17–19, 2011, which marked a
start to a series of killings that claimed several lives.
The police broke up the congress after participants reportedly raised
the outlawed Morning Star flag, a symbol of Papuan independence, and
declared an independent West Papua state.
These events were indeed a display of local Papuans’ disappointment
with the implementation of the Law on Special Autonomy. After a decade
of special autonomy, poverty, corruption, unemployment and poor
infrastructure have remained unaddressed. The autonomy has greatly
succeeded in changing the socioeconomic gap between Papuans and
migrants to the disparity between indigenous Papuans.
In the past, migrant people held socioeconomic and political power.
The picture has changed drastically since the inception of the special
autonomy. Political, economic, social and cultural powers shifted to
the hands of indigenous Papuans.
As mandated by Article 12 of the law, the governor and deputy governor
may only be indigenous Papuans. Similarly, all the members of the
Papua People’s Assembly (MRP) cultural body are exclusively indigenous
Papuans. Article 28 states that indigenous Papuans can establish a
political party.
Indeed, the law provides greater freedom and self-determination rights
in all sectors to Papuan people within the unitary state of the
Republic of Indonesia.
The data in 2011 indicated that the state budget allocation for Papua
reached Rp 28 trillion (US$3.16 billion). Other provinces received
smaller portions of the budget, with Gorontalo earning Rp 5.1
trillion, West Sumatra Rp 16.4 trillion, Banten Rp 13.5 trillion and
oil-rich East Kalimantan — one of the largest provinces in Indonesia —
Rp 7.46 trillion.
Using simple logic, if the Rp 28 trillion was distributed to each of
the 2.8 million people in Papua, everybody would enjoy prosperity.
The question is why indigenous Papuans have remained so powerless and
underdeveloped that some of them have taken to the extreme path of
secessionism. There must be something wrong with the implementation of
the special autonomy.
Nicolaas Jouwe, a self-exiled Papuan who fought for Papuan
independence for 40 years, said upon receiving his Indonesian
citizenship in May 2010 that Papua was an inseparable part of
Indonesia, then a Dutch colony, since 1928, when the territory came
under the auspices of Ternate Sultanate.
Therefore, even without the New York Agreement in 1962 and popular
vote in 1969, Papua, as part of the former Dutch East Indies, has been
integrated into the Republic of Indonesia since its birth on Aug. 17,
1945. From this perspective, Indonesia without Irian Jaya or Papua
cannot be called a fully independent nation.
Jouwe further appealed to those who were struggling for independence
to return to Papua and develop the province within a new Indonesia,
which is more democratic, decentralized and appears to be one of the
world’s emerging economies. There is no reason for Papua to remain
underdeveloped.
The key issue in Papua is how to strengthen social cohesion between
Papuans and non-Papuans. Implementation of the special autonomy law
needs changes to uphold human rights.
Former UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan once said, “We will not enjoy
security without development; we will not enjoy development without
security; and we will not enjoy either without respect for human
rights.”
Therefore, these human rights parameters have to be incorporated in
the special autonomy values, such as the rule of law, democracy, equal
access and opportunity for all, efficiency and clean government and
open society.
This spirit may remind us of Martin Luther King Jr., who said,
“Everybody can be great ... because anybody can serve. You don’t have
to have a college degree to serve. You don’t have to make your subject
and verb agree to serve. You only need a heart full of grace, a soul
generated by love.”
Hopefully by the adoption of those values to serve, Papuans in the
framework of special autonomy will strengthen social cohesion within
the unitary state of Indonesia.
The writer is a professor at the State University of Jakarta, former
director general of Human Rights at the Law and Human Rights Ministry
and former UNESCO consultant in Asia and the Pacific region.
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