Genocide in West Papua?

Let's talk about politic, hey?

In a mailinglist that i am joining in, some people raised Papua's issue. They are annoyed to see "free papua" is advertised in Australian's TV. I havent seen it actually.

Opinions about Papua vary. The Indonesian government officials would unsurprisingly tell the same bollocks. Despite criticism from activists about the deteriorating human rights condition, they maintained that they are doing their best for the easternmost province in Indonesia. Likewise, activists, academics, church organisations have their say about Papua. However, i've noticed that some of them are trying to simplify the problem, perceiving the problem as Papuans vs Indonesians.

John Wing of center of conflict studies at Sydney University said on his speech that there has been genocide in Papua. An English journalist wrote with similar tone to John Wing about Papua. He contended that Papuans are racially discriminated by Indonesians. This racial attitude therefore was the rationale of why human right abuses in Papua have not been solved.

I would not be denying the facts if genocide indeed happened and has been happening in Indonesian's easternmost province, particularly when the facts are collected through a thorough investigation. Yet, the presented evidence were by no means entirely unconvincing. Its research enterprise was pretty much preoccupied with policies and its impact on Papuan society, but it appeared to be conducted in a narrow understanding of New Order policies or, to put it precisely, there is not a great deal of attention paid to New Order authoritarian policies and its impact on the society at large.

Their mediocre analysis obviously showed their inadequate knowledge on Indonesia. Transmigration, family planning (of course military operation) and Islamisation contributed to marginalisation of indigenous people in Papua. Transmigration indeed led to demographic changes but not all migrants are government sponsored. Voluntary migration also took place. Comparatively, transmigration as it was funded by World Bank, was a national program and in this case Papua was not singled out. Likewise, family planning was an icon of New Order development policy. It was heavily campaigned throughout the country. It is very surprising that John Wing did not cite source from Biro Pusat Statistik (Central Bureau of Statistics) to look at the different figures amongst the islands in order to see how these policies affected significantly to depopulating Papuan.

As a rhetoric of human rights, Lemkin created term Genocide has been misused which leads to obfuscation. In Papuan case, the conflict is represented as two ethnics Java and Papuan in antagonistic frame where the former created policies to wipe out the later. Even though 'Javanisation' was closely linked to Suharto style of dictatorship, it has never been proven that he uplifted Javanese at large and discriminated the others. Javanese suffered when Kedung Ombo dam was built and in many occassions conflict over land in Java was rarely succeeded by Javenese. At extreme level, the forming of New Order was tainted by a bloodshed in Java where communist-hunt campaign took nearly 500.000 people life.

This makes me think of others repression during Suharto tenure. No one can fairly deny that coercion was carried out indiscriminately. An important question that need be thrown into discussion is how do we understand the discrimination of Chinese in Indonesia? Chinese have not been disadvantaged group as Indonesians could not fail to notice that Suharto favoured Chinese tycoon as his business partner. But on the cultural and political level, they hardly gained space. If one believes that ethnic identity is crucial, can we then classify New Order attitude toward Chinese as genocide? Allegedly ex-communist members which socially and politically have been controlled during New Order (and to some extent, have been continuing to be controlled since the fall of Suharto) may refer to genocide when they talk about their case--albeit political group is not included in Genocide Convention. How should we respond then if we look at the repression toward Islamic groups which also marked the period of terror during New Order? Do they simply fit the category of genocide if religious group is mentioned in the convention? These blatant examples make the argument absolutely bogus.

Intention is very crucial element in the concept of genocide. Yet it is not an easy task to disclose the motive of perpetrators. Even though, Nazi Holocaust which appeared to be obvious in its motive to murder Jews, on particular case, heated debate over motives was inevitable as it happened between two holocaust historians Goldhagen and Browning.

Sadly, public acknowledgement of his position as researcher which could give him a glorious chance to show in prestigious talks can not make him aware of the responsibility and ethical code as researcher. Response was not given when a guy came up and has a say: "our brothers in Papua were murdered by Jemaah Islamiah".

I find it difficult to criticise publicly as my Indonesian look and identity will justify their claims. "Well it’s not surprising if he had a go with Papuan and pro-independence zealot (mostly leftist). He is Indonesian and will defend his country at any cost". This criticism is also considered to have same tones as government representatives which dispute any claim of gross human rights violations in Papua.