Irian Jaya

More colonial errors in Irian Jaya

Irian Jaya, as a small book, will * welcomed by everyone interested Irian Jaya (West New Guinea), is described by the authors as “an troduction to the complex and un lual problems of Indonesia’s largest ovince”, and it provides a succinct immary of the social, economic and ilitical situation.

In 1828 the Government of Nether nds rather casually took possession the north-west coast of New uinea to the 141st meridian, and /enty years later simply extended i claim to include the south coast id the middle. Germany, Britain \d Australia subsequently took irious bites in a cavalier carving ) of New Guinea which has had smendous repercussions for the :oples of both sides of the border— e nearly 2,500,000 in Papua New uinea and the 850,000 in Irian ya.

The Dutch did very little (either >od or bad) in West Irian until it st the colony, which subsequently :came Indonesia. Then, in a me nge of remorse, desire to repolish i tarnished image, as well as a sub antial hope that West New Guinea >uld be used as a major resettle ent area for Eurasians and a major urce of petroleum products—the utch put great effort into the de lopment of West Irian.

But it was too late—their history as against them—and their pro amme for making West New uinea an independent country by >BO was lost in 1963 when Indo :sia took it over as a “province”.

The towns are now filling with donesians who are displacing elanesians in almost all occu itions including unskilled ones. ;onomic expansion is confined to me rich pockets: the exploitation copper deposits in the Garstenz ountains and the nickel on Gag land, both of which are very large ale. The prospects for oil seem now be very good, while forestry and her possibilities could be substan il.

The Melanesian people are getting

almost nothing out of any of them.

The deals negotiated with the foreign companies exploiting natural re sources seem to be much less favour able to the indigenous people than those on the Papua New Guinea side, not because of Australia, but because the Papua New Guinea people have more political bargaining power themselves.

In the first ten years of its ad ministration Indonesia’s task has been to try to restore some of the services and facilities which had been established by the Dutch, but run down in the early period of Indo nesian takeover.

The general picture is that in most fields these levels are still far from being attained. One exception is in enrolments at primary schools which have increased significantly since the Indonesian takeover, but the evidence suggests that the quality of educa tion is generally low.

The role of military in Irian Jaya

is, like the French territories, all pervasive, and there is clearly a con siderable amount of crude force used.

For the heavily populated high lands, Indonesia has instituted a crash programme called Operasi Koteka—an exercise which includes persuading the Highlanders to dis card their traditional dress and wear trousers, display a national flag and hang a picture of the Indonesian President. Anyone who has seen the numbers of pictures of English royalty in Fijian villages will know that the latter is not unique to Indo nesia, but this ‘humanitarian project’ as it is called appears to be achieving rather little of value.

Pacific Islanders have seen a fair amount of imperialist arrogance from a number of foreign govern ments. What Indonesia is doing is nothing really new to the Pacific, but what is sad is that it is occurring at a time in history when some of the other imperialist powers have been

reed to revise their thinking—or at ist their techniques.

Like the French in New Caledonia d Tahiti, and like the Americans Guam, Indonesians deny that they e a colonial power and insist that eir territories are an integral part the metropolitan country. But latever wording is used, the people West New Guinea are, like the ople of the French and American •ritories, a subject people.

One advantage of withdrawing ac owledged colonial powers is that ;y have to have a policy of local ities But Indonesia, like France, lists that everybody is a citizen d an “equal” and uses this rational tion to refuse significant priority local people.

The Indonesian Government allo tes more resources per head to the ople of Irian Jaya than it does to ler provinces in Indonesia. This iicates their real interest, but Indo sia is so poor and so disorganised present that this does not amount much.

It obviously wants to make ‘a good )’ of the administration of ‘the ovince’ and to incorporate it firmly 0 Indonesia. But from what has jn seen elsewhere of the delayed iction against imperial domination, ; Free Papua Movement or some er equivalent may ultimately umph and obtain independence.

This is probably a long way off, 1 in the meantime Indonesia is thusiastically committing the same id of errors, with the same self hteous arrogance, that the other onial powers in the Pacific com tted.

Garnaut and Manning write dis ssionately, but it is clear that the flanesian people are much worse than they were—and almost cer nly much worse off than they uld have been if Indonesia had t insisted on her own imperial ex ision when they objected so

angly (and understandably) to

itch imperialism.

The major criticism is not of this >st useful book, but of the price ich the publishers demand for it. e text is only 110 pages and yet “recommended” selling price is 8.95.

Lhis is a disgraceful exploitation monopoly rights which the pub ler has on a publication for which re is likely to be considerable de nd, for Indonesia ensures that less □rmation is publicly available on an Jaya than on any other Pacific /eminent —except perhaps the Re flic of Nauru.— R. G. Crocombe. [RIAN JAYA, by R. Garnaut and C. nning. Australian National University ss, Canberra. $8.95.)