Political Dialogue
West Papua: Indonesia's continuing shame
By Damien Kingsbury
Apr 2, 2008, 16:59

Comment by Richard Samuelson

http://www.crikey.com.au/Politics/20080401-West-Papua-Indonesias-continuing-
shame.html?display=thankyou#comments

Tuesday, 1 April 2008 6:48:50 PM

How much longer do the West Papuans have to suffer continuing violence and
intimidation at the hands of the indonesian military whilst the Australian,
British and US governments look on, stay silent and do nothing? President
Yudhoyono has had four years to fulfill his promises.

Damien Kingsbury is right to identify deeply ingrained Javanese anti-Papuan
racism as being at the heart of Jakarta's reluctance to enter into genuine
dialogue with West Papuan leaders, coupled with a knowledge that following
the sham 1969 Act of NO Choice, West Papua's legal and moral claim to
self-determination is rock solid.

The Free West Papua Campaign (UK) would however question Mr Kingsbury's
suggestion that the "L" in the West Papua National Coalition for Liberation
(WPNCL) doesn't necessarily mean "liberation". Ask any West Papuan what they
really want (if they feel safe in telling you their true feelings) and they
will say "MERDEKA PENUH - FULL INDEPENDENCE!"

Richard Samuelson, Oxford, England


Richard Samuelson
Free West Papua Campaign, Oxford, UK.
www.freewestpapua.org


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West Papua: Indonesia's continuing shame

By Damien Kingsbury, Associate Head (Research) of the School of
International and Political Studies at Deakin University and author of "The
Politics of Indonesia"

Entering its tenth year since the fall of the authoritarian President
Suharto, Indonesia has progressed towards consolidating its democratic
system, respecting rule of law and resolving ethnic grievances.

Notably, after a couple of false starts, the direct election of President
Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono helped consolidate Indonesia's reform process. Yet
despite this progress, Indonesia retains a blot on its democratic and human
rights record; that of West Papua.

There was some hope after 2001 that Indonesia's process of political and
economic decentralization would allow West Papua a degree of genuine
autonomy.

On paper, the "special autonomy" package offered to West Papua, and
Indonesia's other formerly troubled province of Aceh, looked to address many
outstanding issues.

Yet as has since been noted by many observers, West Papua's "special
autonomy" status has been methodically undermined until it has become next
to meaningless.

In particular, dividing the province into three provinces, later ratified by
Indonesia's constitutional court as two, destroyed much of the substance of
its autonomy package. A proposal to create even further provinces even
further diminishes the original "special autonomy" package.

Meanwhile, since the redeployment of troops following Aceh's successfully
negotiated peace settlement, West Papua has seen a significant build-up of
soldiers and paramilitary police. The human rights situation, while not at
record bad levels, has consequently deteriorated.

Underlying West Papua's problems with Jakarta has been the means by which
the territory was incorporated into the state in 1968. In this, a little
over one thousand hand-picked village leaders were compelled to ratify West
Papua's forced incorporation into Indonesia in 1963. This process was
sanctioned by the UN, but has since been discredited.

West Papua was not only constructed by many Indonesian leaders as central to
completing their nationalist project, but the wealth it generates has since
underpinned Indonesia's economy.

As a largely self-funded institution, Indonesia's military, the TNI, also
has a major economic stake in West Papua, and for both reasons is profoundly
opposed to its separation.

Yet for a wealthy province, most West Papuans are poor, have abysmally low
levels of education, health care and other development indicators.

And, as Melanesians, West Papuans are looked upon by malay Indonesians with
attitudes ranging from pity to contempt. Many Indonesians, in particular in
the military, regard West Papuans as being less than fully human, which has
exacerbated human rights abuses.

Following the Aceh peace agreement which has seen that province prosper in
peace over the past two years, many West Papuan political leaders hoped for
a similar resolution.

In order to achieve this, last year the province's disparate political
groups, including the Free Papua Organisation (OPM), came together under an
umbrella organization, the West Papua National Coalition for Liberation
(WPNCL).

The word "liberation" in the WPNCL's title refers to freeing West Papuans
from oppression, not necessarily separating from Indonesia.

However, to date, President Yudhoyono has refused to talk with the WPNCL, at
least under international mediation, perhaps fearing political backlash from
the often fractious and self-serving politics of Jakarta.

Yet following from Aceh's relative success, such a process might offer a
means of resolving Indonesia's outstanding separatist issue while
significantly improving the lives of a people who have been treated as
second class citizens.

From an international perspective, such a resolution would remove a
significant impediment from relations with Indonesia, particularly with
Australia and the United States.

The West Papua issue retains the potential to destabilize bilateral
relations, especially in Australia was faced with accepting another
boat-load of West Papuan asylum seekers. Last year's Lombok Treaty does not
trump Australia's international and humanitarian obligations to legitimate
refugees, and the West Papuan issue continues to come up with members of the
US Congress.

It is in Indonesia's interests, and those of its friends, to see the West
Papua problem disappear. This cannot happen by sweeping it under the carpet,
as with East Timor until the fateful referendum of 1999.

Rather, the problem of West Papua will only disappear when the government of
Indonesia decides to seriously address the myriad issues that have bedeviled
the territory.

The international community has a role in monitoring events in West Papua,
at least as best it can given the continuing restrictions on travel there.
And the international community might, as with Aceh, have a role in
mediating and overseeing the implementation of any future agreement.

In this, Indonesia can build on its success in Aceh, which brought the
government international accolades including Nobel Peace Prize nominations.
The question really is, though, whether Indonesia is still serious about
reform, or whether the gains of democratization will again be allowed to
slip between it political fingers.

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