Irian Jaya, An Uneasy Neighbour
pp. 8-9 · Read in the full issue
For A Worried Papua New Guinea
Newly-independent Papua New Guinea has an uneasy neighbour on her left - Irian Jaya or West New Guinea, or, before the Act of Free Choice, which made the territory part of Indonesia, Dutch New Guinea. Irian Jaya is uneasy because of the emergence of a revolutionary force styling itself the Provisional Government of the Republic of West Papua /New Guinea. There have been stories of rebel bands operating along the border with Papua New Guinea and that makes Papua New Guinea uneasy, so uneasy that Foreign Minister Sir Maori Kiki has, with Indonesia's knowledge, had secret meetings with rebel leaders in an effort to mediate. Below, and on succeeding pages, PIM presents two sides, Indonesian efforts to develop Irian Jaya, written by Indonesian R.S.Roosman of the Department of Political Studies at the University of Papua New Guinea, and the rebels' side as told to PIM by the rebel leaders who have established their headquarters at Dakar, capita! of the West A frican republic of Senegal.
By R. S. Roosman
“The government does not pro mise a paradise on earth in her 5year national reconstruction plan.
However, special attention will be given to West Irian”, were President Suharto’s words when he addressed the Jakarta House of Representatives on August 16, 1%9, on the eve of Indonesia’s 24th anniversary of In dependence.
“It is a challenge for us to raise the standard of living of our back ward brothers to a level comparable to that of their brothers in the other regions of Indonesia. This effort needs heavily to be subsidised”.
On Sepicmber 16, 1969, the presi dent flew to Jayapura to address the West Irian House of Representatives, urged “full participation of West Irian’s population in the deve lopment programme”, and stressed that West Irian’s administrative appa ratus would be directed towards reconstruction. He visited several in land areas, and instituted the Task Force with the sole aim of develop ing West Irian’s rural sector.
On his Jayapura visit he also in augurated West Irian as an auto nomous province. The Indonesian concept of regional autonomy, how ever, should be interpreted rather as deconcentration of power from the central government. It is obvious that Indonesia’s policy toward Irian Jaya is one of increasingly strength ening its ties with Jakarta rather than lessening them. The Jakarta appointed governor of Irian Jaya, the highest official in the province, func tions also as chairman of the Task Force Programme with the military
commander as its co-chairman.
With a land surface of 413,000 square kilometres inhabited by only 994,754 people, most of whom still live in the neolithic age, a rural de velopment in the modern sense would be impossible without bring ing in technical assistance from out side its territory. Only with the re cent discoveries of new oil reserves and mineral ores (nickel and copper) in Irian Jaya, one can expect that the financial subsidies from the cen tral government would be relieved by reyenues and other incomes from the oil and mineral resources.
The Task Force programme repre sents only one of the several govern mental programmes now being car ried out in Irian Jaya. The Task Force subsidy amounts were Rp 500 million in 1969-70, Rp 750 million in 1971-72 (600 rupiah to approxi mately SAI). The 1972-73-74 figures are not directly available.
On November 9, 1969 an appeal was made to the public to take part in the “Humanitarian Project” fund raising drive, as part of the Task Force programme. About 5,000
wealthy businessmen (mostly Jakarta
residents), the top echelons of the public service and military, commun ity and religious leaders, diplomats and the press were invited to the Bogor Presidential Palace. Blown up photographs of rural life in West Irian were on display inside the palace.
Symbolically, West Irian repre sentatives were invited and shown around. Referring to some pictures
on exhibit where fierce-looking Dani tribesmen of the Jayawijaya highlands around Wamena were seen wearing the koteka (penis-gourds), the Pre sident dramatised his appeal by say ing: “It is almost unbelievable that our brothers in West Irian are scr minimally dressed”. He urged the public to aid 200,000 children in rural West Irian with clothing and schooling. By February 27, 1971, the “Humanitarian Project” had netted a total of Rp191,704,221.69 and an additional $U538,180.28.
Suharto’s idea inspired Irian Jaya’s governor Acub Zainal—in 1971 military commander of the locally-stationed Cendera-wash (Bird of Paradise) Division—to initiate the “Operation Koteka” by distributing essential clothing to the inland population and upgrading the primi tive villages to more contemporary conditions. As from April 1, 1975, Acub Zainal was replaced by Sutran who was promoted to governor on the merits of his successful rural de velopment programme in Eastern Java where he was district adminis trator or bupati.
During its operation, 356,310 short pants for men and 89,077 sarongs for women were distributed in the rural districts of Merauke, Jayawijaya, Paniai and Manokwari.
This effort is generally considered as unsuccessful since the Highland people, in particular, have shown themselves to be rather unresponsive to the idea. Also, the governor’s in struction was sometimes not tactfully carried out due to ambition and ignorance of local customs.
In other sectors, the Koteka
Operation proved to be more suc cessful: 262 local students graduated from the illiteracy eradication course and 33 from the village development training, 469 new villages and an other 4,493 additional houses for resettlement were built together with 86 kilometres of road and 95 bridges, 188,737 square metres of experi mental food gardens and 552 fish ponds were established.
Different from the other provinces in Indonesia where, because of the rapid population increase, the em phasis of village development is laid on food production, in Irian Jaya first preference is given to the re habilitation and improvement of the infrastructure of overland, air and sea communications.
Second preference is given to rais ing the quality of the local work force by teaching them new skills, and agriculture comes only third.
Due to stiff competition among the poor farmers, and even more so among the farm labourers in over populated Java wanting to migrate to other areas of Indonesia, the government sets strict requirements to its transmigration scheme; eg the candidate migrant must be a farmer by profession, not older than 45 years, with not more than four child ren. Preference is given to married couples.
In Irian Jaya, each migrant couple is allocated two hectares which they have to divide into one hectare for rice cultivation—whenever irrigation is possible—half a hectare for a food garden, planted with mainly tubers and vegetables, and the remaining half hectare for erecting a village house with locally available materials such as gabargaba (sago stems), wood, and bamboo, with corrugated iron roofs from tl\e Department of Trans-migration. The migrant settlers are also encouraged to breed chickens, sheep and goats.
Tribal land in Irian Jaya, which is given for development, consists primarily of virgin jungle which has to be cleared by slash-and-burn, a phase in land cultivation which in Java, had, for centuries, belonged to the past. It is interesting to notice how the Javanese migrants, being unfamiliar with this method, imitate the local Irianese and plant the cleared jungle with local food plants such as taro and yams, and only after the first harvest with the more familiar corn, manioc, peanuts, and string-beans. The seeds are provided by the Department of Agriculture, in Jose co-operation with the Depart ment of Trans-migration, which is responsible for the entire trans migration scheme.
The deal that a tribal community usually makes with the local ad ministration to allow part of its tri bal land to be developed by migrants is based on certain promises; eg that the government builds roads, a school, a polyclinic, and a church in the village, within a certain time limit. Not fulfilling these promises could easily lead to protests, causing troubles in the area, as has hap pened with the local trans-migration office and the migrant settlers’ colony becoming objects for angry demonstrations.
In the agricultural sector, the Task Force instigates an “accelerated acculturation process” by trans migrating Javanese farmers to Irian Jaya in “mixed settlements” with with local villagers.
This occurred, tor instance, in Warmare in the Manokwari district with 30 farmer families from Southern Jogjakarta (Central Java) and 150 families of the Arfak tribe.
The author saw another example in Dosai, 60 kilometres from Jayapura where Javanese farmers live together with local villagers, and it seems that the latter were on good terms with the newcomers.
For socio-psychological reasons, the newly-arrived migrants tend to be cliquish, while their children easily assimilate with the local child ren attending the same schools.