By Arie Setyaningrum Pamungkas
ABSTRACT:
This paper identified the problem of
land conflict faced by the indigenous tribe (Suku Amungme) in West Papua,
Indonesia. This problem caused by the recognition program offered by the
Government of Indonesia (GOI) and Freeport Company in order to minimise the
effect of environmental destruction caused by the gold mining in Timika, West
Papua. Possible effect is questioned in this paper to ask about the indigenous
rights which may involve in conducting development process. Solution are
addressed to contribute some possible ideas which may apply to overcome the
problem.
BACKGROUND
The gold mining in Timika, West Papua has
polluted ‘the Wanagon’ lake, the major river ‘Ajkwa’ and several streams
surrounding, which is deadly for human life. The water was contaminated by
tailings which affected the quality of Sago trees as the main resource of food
for the locals. It also has impact on sedimentation along the watershed, which
affected to the decreasing number of fish which was their additional food.
There are various responds to this situation, but most of the locals who live
nearby the gold mining saw this problem as land conflict between the locals and
the government who give privilege to certain investor such as Freeport
Corporation. Therefore, both of the Indonesian government and the corporation
concern about the land problem as a key to find the appropriate solution which
may satisfy the locals. After facing some critics, PT Freeport Indonesia (PTFI)
offered the land concession program which is called ‘recognition program’.
Based
on the concept of recognition since 1997, PT Freeport initiated to conduct
recognition in order to reconcile with the locals by building new settlement
for them. There are at least four tribes surrounding the mine as the target of
this program: Komoro, Tipuka, Nawaripi, and Amungme. Despite the fact that most
tribes surrounding the fields accepted the program, only one tribe rejected the
offered program which is: ‘suku Amungme’.“But why did this tribe reject the program?” Before we try to discuss the problem,
we have to take a look at the definition of indigenous and indigenous rights
which related to this discussion. Then this could help us to figure out some
possible causes and possible solutions for overcoming the problem.
THE DEFINITION OF INDIGENOUS AND INDIGENOUS RIGHTS
According
to the term developed by World Bank (1991), indigenous covers indigenous,
tribal, low caste and ethnic minority groups. Despite their historical and
cultural differences, they often have limited capacity to participate in
development process because of cultural barriers or economical and political
subordination.
Robert
Knox Denton etal (Murphy is quoted) define indigenous peoples as: descendants
of the peoples who inhabited the present territory of a country wholly or
partially at the time when persons of a different culture or ethnic origin
arrived there from other part of the world, overcame them and, by conquest,
settlement or other means, reduced them to a non-dominant colonial situation.
Meanwhile,
Marcus Colchester (1995) define the indigenous rights which include 3 claims:
1.
The right
to ownership and control their territories (based on Article no.11 of ILO
Convention 107)
2.
The right
of self determination (based on the International Covenants of Civil and
Political Rights and of Economic, Social and Cultural Rights)
3.
The right
to represent themselves through their own institutions (Article no.2 of ILO
Convention 169)
In
order to solve the problem of land conflict caused by the extensive production
of PT Freeport Indonesia, both of the corporation and the government of
Indonesia (GOI) offered a new method of concession called ‘recognition’. PT
Freeport and GOI regard the concept of recognition with 2 legal assumption:
1.
Indonesian
Agrarian Act (UUPA) No.5/1960, Article No.3, which stated about the state
recognition to the indigenous land in term of no contrary with the national
interest. This means that if the land is very valuable for the national
interest it should be owned by the government for the maximum profits gained by
the government.
2.
The
minister of Agrarian Rules No.1/1994, Article No.29 which stated about the
types of concession in land conflict between the local indigenous and the
government. It applies to the practice of ‘recognition’ by building new
settlement and infrastructure for the locals.
POSSIBLE CAUSE
There
are three possible causes of this problem which are: the detriments for the
people surrounding the fields keep occur, the maladjustment of the Amungme
caused by cultural disjunction, the ambivalent of legal system (Agrarian Act)
which does not guarantee the win-win solution.
According to Mardi Y Hutomo (1999), there are 3
detriment for the people surrounding the fields:
(1) Firstly, it is called “resources
loss” that they can no longer
obtain benefits from the natural resources. This means that there’s nothing
last for them because the production still continues and the environmental
destruction keep occurs.
(2) Secondly, it is
“external diseconomy” which related to the burden caused by the
side effects from the pollution. Within this detriment, the Amungme can no
longer rely on the available Sago along the watershed as their main food
because it was contaminated by tailings.
(3) Thirdly, it is “the lost of
inter-temporary opportunity cost” which has consequence to the next
generation of loosing their opportunity to gain benefits from their own land.
Most of the tribes (Nawaripi, Tipuka, and
Komoro) can easily adjust to the new settlement because they have no boundaries
of having a modern life. This is
because they rely on agriculture as their civilisations where the modern life
found its basic form. Sociologist said that agriculture is the basic form of a
modern life when people first use their simple technology to grow their
crops.
By contrast, the Amungme
have a big problem with maladjustment because they have a unique custom. They
believe that ‘land’ is their mother therefore they don’t want to hurt the land
by building or cropping anything on it. Basically, they only rely on the river
(fishing) and the watershed (collecting Sago). The Amungme live in the vessels
on the river, therefore they do not want to move out from it. They have a
practical beliefs which is based on the activities on the river. They taught
their children how to survive and how to get mature by learning from the
nature. A new settlement has caused dispute among this tribe, because some of
them thought that they do not have other choice, while the others still
insisted to keep their heritage. This was because they have a duty from God to
save the river and His gift (Sago) along the watershed. Some Amungmes believe
that if they move away from the river or from the watershed there will be a
curse that they have to pay, as a consequence God will demolish their
existence.
The legal system in Indonesia particularly in
agrarian matter, has some limitations. It regards with the interpretation of
putting priority for the national interest which sometimes ignited to the
dispute between “State” and “People”. In the name of State, the government can
claim the ownership of ‘open-land’ (the practice of acquisition) which
originally inherited by the locals (indigenous). Sometimes it causes
disappointment among the locals which may cause social unrest.
POSSIBLE EFFECT
Based
on the potential conflict caused by inappropriate program such as
‘recognition’, there are two possible effect as its result. Firstly, the
Amungme will become more and more fragile because of the social injustice. This
results in the fact when the Amungme have been experiencing crisis for their
existence because they eat contaminated food. Secondly, it may also affected
some other conflict such as riots (social unrest). There are some disagreement
and disputes among the Amungme themselves, due to the dilemma they have faced
about maintaining their life in one side and preserving their culture and
belief on the other side. As a result, sometimes war among the Amungme
inevitably occurred, on the the other hand, hatred and dissatisfaction within
the group who try to preserve their culture addressed to PT FI and Government
keep growing.
POSSIBLE SOLUTIONS
In
order to overcome this problem we have to distinguish the short-term and the
long-term solutions. Within short term we can identify 3 possible solutions as
our priority. First, we have to consider the involvement of the locals to
determine their development method by putting the cultural values as a basic
consideration. The opportunity of regional autonomy should give some tasks for
local government to identify the indigenous rights in their territories and
protect their rights by involving them in decision making process. Secondly,
there should be a legal advocacy to the people who suffered from exploitation
by addressing the effort of eliminating the practice of natural destruction.
Thirdly, it is close related with the second solutions by stopping the mining
production for temporary, until there’s a guarantee from the company to
preserve the environment.
For
long period, there are three possible tasks that we have to prepare:
(1) First, we
have to conduct a sustainable development which is based on local abilities to
develop their own society. Sustainable development refers to sustainable use
includes not just biological diversity, but also maintaining ecological
functions and maintaining of natural produce which is essential to the
livelihoods of local people. Developing a bio-region could be the example for
this purpose. Within bio-region there are some responsibilities that should be
done by the different actors.
(2) Secondly, there should be law improvement which
facilitate the people’s rights by creating the division of state, private and
communal of land ownership. From the division of land ownership, we might hope
that there will be no contrary in land use system for the next future.
(3) Thirdly,
there should be a new arrangement in investment by involving the awareness of
preserving local environment as obligation for the investor. In this effort the
ownership and the mobilisation of natural resources should be under controlled
by the committee which represent the indigenous interest.
RECOMMENDATION
Learning from the previous problem
where the land conflict was ignited to the riot, we have to put our priority by
preventing it through appropriate concession. For some extend the ‘recognition’
project could be apply as a medium solution, but in case of Amungme we have to
decide the long term effect of loosing our future. This means that the effort
to save the environment should be the most priority among other solutions. We
can not imagine that our next generation will loose everything, because what we
already have now does not belong to us, we just borrow it from our children.
In
short, stopping the mining production will initiate the whole process of preserving
the environment. Nevertheless, we have to consider the practice of sustainable
development as a prospect way to maintain our society without hurting the local
values in the name of development.
REFERENCES:
Anti-Slavery
Society.1991. West Papua: Plunder in Paradise. London: Anti-Slavery
Society.
Asian NGO Coalition.1989. People’s
Participation and Environmentally Sustainable Development. Manila: Asian NGO Coalition For Agrarian
Reform and Rural Development.
Butcher, David, 1988. A
Review of Land Acquisition And Resettlement Under Four World Bank Financed
Project in Indonesia. Washington,D.C:World Bank.
Colchester, Martin. 1995. Indigenous People Rights and
Sustainable Resource Use in South and Southeast Asia. In Indigenous Peoples
of Asia, eds. Barnes, Gray, and Kingsbury.Michigan: University of Michigan.
Hutomo, Mardi Y, 1999.
Rekognisi Sebagai Penyelesaian Konflik Pertanahan. (Recognition as a
Land-Conflict Concession in Case of PT Freeport Indonesia). Paper presented at
seminar, SEJATI Jakarta.
Murphy,
Julia. May 2001. “Studies in ethnicity and change” for teaching about
Indigenous American Ethnologist. American Ethnologist Journal, Arlington;
Vo.28, Iss. 2; pg.3. Flinders University Central Library. Proquest. (cited
February 4, 2002).
*Paper presented at the Australian Studies Centre, The University of Melbourne 2003
