A West Papua Report Interview
with Zely Ariane
What is #PapuaItuKita?
What is #PapuaItuKita?
We established #PapuaItuKita (We Are Papua, PIK) in December 2015, not as what it has now become but just as a bunch of us who wanted to do something to respond to the Paniai killings and put pressure on Jokowi. We started it just as a tagline, using the hash tag strategy that was successfully being used by activists in other countries, like "I'll ride with you" in Australia and against police brutality in the U.S. We wanted the President to speak out about the four teenagers being killed, which was so outrageous with everyone knowing who killed them but nothing being done about it. I talked with Vero, a member of LBH, and Bernard, a Papuan based in Jakarta, and the three of us decided to begin with a social media posting to call for a demo.
Surprisingly around 40 people turned up. We just used online posters and Facebook, and we only knew about two-thirds of the people who showed up. This encouraged us and we followed up by organizing a candlelight vigil. It's the first such initiative since activities [by NAPAS (National Papua Solidarity)], stalled around a year and a half ago, and this time it has been lead by Indonesians from the start instead of Papuans and that's important. It's a mix of NGO activists, young people who are grassroots activists, people involved in land rights struggles. There are still many people who were involved in NAPAS, but also others. There is less of the left movement and organizations, but it's not that they don't support the issue. Because this is an all-volunteer effort, people need to be able to spare their own time to be involved.
The face is Indonesian rather than Papuan and that's important.
Why do you think it is important for Indonesians to be active on Papua?
The
people of Indonesia don't know much about Papua - there are still stereotypes.
We want to make a bridge between Papua and Indonesia, because Indonesians have
a role in everything that happens there.
We
also want to make our approach very popular, because we saw in the last
election many young people voted for Jokowi, but at the same time they were
very critical about the process of voting. They are very critical and it's
important that we reach out to them. We need to build this layer of discourse
and we need a playful atmosphere to draw this out. We just want to create the
atmosphere in Indonesia and what Papuans do is up to themselves. They are
already doing their work anyway and don't need our help for that. So we want to
help the Papuans by speaking to our nation instead.
What are the difficulties in raising public awareness in Indonesia around human rights in Papua?
The Indonesian public is very blind towards Papua. The issues of Aceh and Timor were very much on the table, people talked about it. But not with Papua. It's only been the government version, and the alternative version has only been the human rights issue. This is good, but it's not enough. There is also the nationalism issue.
One colleague from Solidamor [Solidarity for Timor-Leste Peace Settlement] in Yogyakarta told me that for him, they saw Timor-Leste under Indonesian occupation as more obvious because it was a "real" invasion in 1975. They saw it different for Papua, even if the events in the 1960s are very contested by Papuans.
What are the difficulties in raising public awareness in Indonesia around human rights in Papua?
The Indonesian public is very blind towards Papua. The issues of Aceh and Timor were very much on the table, people talked about it. But not with Papua. It's only been the government version, and the alternative version has only been the human rights issue. This is good, but it's not enough. There is also the nationalism issue.
One colleague from Solidamor [Solidarity for Timor-Leste Peace Settlement] in Yogyakarta told me that for him, they saw Timor-Leste under Indonesian occupation as more obvious because it was a "real" invasion in 1975. They saw it different for Papua, even if the events in the 1960s are very contested by Papuans.
It's
not the same strength as Aceh and Timor so the public hasn't been the same. Because
of this I hope the ULMWP [application for membership in the MSG, see below]
will help shock the Indonesian public, because they need to be shocked. Like
what the CNRT and SIRA did for Timor and Aceh.
What do you see as an acceptable solution to the conflict in Papua?
We don't have any prejudice on the independence issue. A common response with students or with activists is that they hope Papua will not separate from Indonesia, but we don't really care about that. We haven't had a discussion on what we see as an acceptable solution, but what comes out of our discussions is that there is no individual inside PIK who says that they hope Papua will not separate from Indonesia.
At this time we are just raising public awareness, we don't have a view on the future for Papua at the moment. We are united in our view that there needs to be change in policy, in terms of military, natural resources, to open political space. But we're not allergic to the political issue so we can continue looking at this.
Are there any prospects for changing Indonesia's policy on self-determination in the region?
Not from above. It's very unfortunate for Papua. This issue so far has only been brought up at the national level through Muridan S. Widojo and his team [of LIPI, who passed away in March 2014] through the Road Map for Papua. That is the only "respectable", the highest policy process that has addressed it; no other national figures do that. With Aceh and Timor there were many academics and others who would present it, but with Papua it's only Papuans.
What do you see as an acceptable solution to the conflict in Papua?
We don't have any prejudice on the independence issue. A common response with students or with activists is that they hope Papua will not separate from Indonesia, but we don't really care about that. We haven't had a discussion on what we see as an acceptable solution, but what comes out of our discussions is that there is no individual inside PIK who says that they hope Papua will not separate from Indonesia.
At this time we are just raising public awareness, we don't have a view on the future for Papua at the moment. We are united in our view that there needs to be change in policy, in terms of military, natural resources, to open political space. But we're not allergic to the political issue so we can continue looking at this.
Are there any prospects for changing Indonesia's policy on self-determination in the region?
Not from above. It's very unfortunate for Papua. This issue so far has only been brought up at the national level through Muridan S. Widojo and his team [of LIPI, who passed away in March 2014] through the Road Map for Papua. That is the only "respectable", the highest policy process that has addressed it; no other national figures do that. With Aceh and Timor there were many academics and others who would present it, but with Papua it's only Papuans.
Two
months before Muridan died, he told me they were stuck in the dialog process,
not because the dialogue itself, but because there was no willingness from the
SBY government. The government is stuck in the mindset of Harga Mati NKRI [the
Unitary State of the Republic of Indonesia or Death]. It's not that they can't
understand the problems, but they've already formed their view. Seeing it from
NKRI doesn't work, but that's the view that everyone in government has. If they
don't have this view, they become marginalized.
Change needs to come from below. This can happen from Indonesia or from Papua -- either way. We want to create the atmosphere to talk about these things. Our first step is to mockNKRI Harga Mati, to say we love our country, but we don't need to do it in such a hard way. We want it so people can speak freely about their national identity, because there is a problem with their national identity. We want to make nationalism into a simple discourse.
For me personally, I look at what Joshua Oppenheimer did, to open the discourse on 1965. There were over 400 screenings nationwide of The Look of Silence. I want to do the same thing with Papua. Whatever term we want to use, the discourse needs to be opened. It's very dangerous the way it is now.
If there's nothing we can do in the next five years, Papuans will become like the Aborigines in Australia. The [indigenous] population has decreased so much already.
Change needs to come from below. This can happen from Indonesia or from Papua -- either way. We want to create the atmosphere to talk about these things. Our first step is to mockNKRI Harga Mati, to say we love our country, but we don't need to do it in such a hard way. We want it so people can speak freely about their national identity, because there is a problem with their national identity. We want to make nationalism into a simple discourse.
For me personally, I look at what Joshua Oppenheimer did, to open the discourse on 1965. There were over 400 screenings nationwide of The Look of Silence. I want to do the same thing with Papua. Whatever term we want to use, the discourse needs to be opened. It's very dangerous the way it is now.
If there's nothing we can do in the next five years, Papuans will become like the Aborigines in Australia. The [indigenous] population has decreased so much already.
How
do you see the relationship between President Jokowi and the security forces
developing, both generally and in the context of West Papua particularly? Does
the President have the respect and full cooperation of the military, police and
intelligence services
I don't have any authority to talk about this precisely because I don't observe it that closely. But you can see what [West Papuan journalist] Victor Mambo says in any forum that the key to any Papua policy is to have control in Papua. The government can say anything, but they have their own way of operating in Papua itself. All the government bodies act differently there, separated from Jakarta.
But from what I see now, it is very obvious that Jokowi doesn't have any control. With the Paniai killings, he gave a speech saying there shouldn't be any violence, and right after that there was more violence. We can't say whether it was done on purpose, but at the least it shows he has no control.
Also, look at the discourse on establishing a Kodam in Manokwari and Brimob in Wamena. He didn't have a say on this. I don't think he has an understanding of how to deal with the problems differently than the previous government. He still approaches it as if there is a change in people's economic welfare the problems will be overcome but this won't work. On the [access for foreign] journalists it's the same issue. It's like there's no control, and it's a pity.
Find #PapuaItuKita on Facebook https://www.facebook.com/pages/Papua-Itu-Kita and Twitter https://twitter.com/PapuaItuKita
I don't have any authority to talk about this precisely because I don't observe it that closely. But you can see what [West Papuan journalist] Victor Mambo says in any forum that the key to any Papua policy is to have control in Papua. The government can say anything, but they have their own way of operating in Papua itself. All the government bodies act differently there, separated from Jakarta.
But from what I see now, it is very obvious that Jokowi doesn't have any control. With the Paniai killings, he gave a speech saying there shouldn't be any violence, and right after that there was more violence. We can't say whether it was done on purpose, but at the least it shows he has no control.
Also, look at the discourse on establishing a Kodam in Manokwari and Brimob in Wamena. He didn't have a say on this. I don't think he has an understanding of how to deal with the problems differently than the previous government. He still approaches it as if there is a change in people's economic welfare the problems will be overcome but this won't work. On the [access for foreign] journalists it's the same issue. It's like there's no control, and it's a pity.
Find #PapuaItuKita on Facebook https://www.facebook.com/pages/Papua-Itu-Kita and Twitter https://twitter.com/PapuaItuKita
Sem comentários:
Enviar um comentário