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INFO PAPUA : West Papua News

Letters: Don't stereotype Papuans
By The Jakarta Post
Mar 12, 2010, 21:26

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Saturday, March 13, 2010 3:16 AM
Fri, 03/12/2010 2:18 PM | Readers Forum

I reckon those who speak on behalf of West Papuans never ever feel like the West Papuans themselves. Sometimes it is easier to judge a book by its cover.

I was brought up in West Papua as the "product" of interracial marriage (if I can say, since West Papuan is definitely a different race to Malay aka Indonesia) as a hybrid product and was brought up in two cultures. While based on my father's line I'm a non West-Papuan (Javanese indeed), from my physical appearance (more like one of the "mixed generation") I'm trapped somewhere in between.

I do agree with what P.M. Erza Killian (The Jakarta Post, March 1) says about "recognition".

I witnessed how my West Papuan friends were treated differently in a classroom and society. I witnessed how my non-West Papuan teachers related the aspect of ethnicity with the quality of human beings.

Yes, education is just one of the solutions that can be offered to West Papua but my question is how can justice happen in education if the stereotypes provided to West Papuans remains the same?

How can justice and recognition occur if the stereotypes or racial thoughts exist in the minds of the teachers and some other non West-Papuans? I suppose one of the authors of this article had worked in West Papua.

Come on! You may have lived in one area in West Papua but have you ever been to other parts of West Papua and witnessed how the military worked before and after the New Order? I personally believe sometimes we feel and believe we know what the best thing is for other people.

However, sometimes you have to put yourself in other peoples' shoes.

What would you do if most of your male relatives had been kidnapped, died in custody or were killed without trial or explanation and the killer(s) were labeled "heroes"?

What would you do if your family members had been removed from their land just because other people who had power and military backing said, "come on, we signed this contract bla bla bla, so you'd better back off!"

What would you do if your religion and race played an important part in applying for a job or even renting a house? (Trust me, I faced this kind of discrimination two years ago just because my physical appearance.)

Even though I'm just half West-Papuan and my ID doesn't show my ethnicity as a native West Papuan, I am proud to say I am West Papuan.

I learned from both of my cultures that the only reason why we never find any solutions to the problems in West Papua is because we're afraid about something we don't know.

I learned a lot from my mother's big family, from my West Papuan neighbors, from other Javanese's families in my father's community group in my hometown, and from other Indonesians in Jakarta.

My question is why we're so afraid to tell the truth about West Papua and its history? Why is it that the word "merdeka" spoken by a West Papuan can be such a "taboo"? I agree that some of the high-ranking officials in local government do not have any good will to empower the local people.

It is really unfair to blame or even make such stereotypes for other West Papuans. I also remember Napoleon Bonaparte's sayings about the government and that's actually what the government should to think about IF the central government considers West Papua as part of Indonesia:

"I am sometimes a fox and sometimes a lion. The whole secret of government lies in knowing when to be the one or the other"

He also said: "One must change one's tactics every 10 years if one wishes to maintain one's superiority."

It is really hard to deliver peace if things in the past and present remain unresolved. It is easier to judge something if you are just an outsider.

Dayanara Meimosaki

Australia

© Copyright by w@tchPAPUA

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