West Papua
Our news media rarely gives adequate coverage to what goes on elsewhere in the world. New Internationalist magazine recently reported on the awful abuses happening in West Papua, and we thought Voice readers might like to know about what has been happening on another island, even if on the other side of the world.
“Imagine a referendum in which just 0.2 per cent of the population were allowed to vote. Imagine that every one of those voters was marched to the voting station at gunpoint, and told exactly what choice to make. Would you believe the result truly represented the wishes of the people?
This is exactly what happened in the Pacific nation of West Papua in 1969. The occupying Indonesian army marched 1,026 handpicked West Papuans (from a population of 800,000) in front of election officials. These ‘voters’ were ordered to raise their hands at the right moment or be shot. This ‘Act of Free Choice’ was then presented to the world as an unequivocal vote in favour of Indonesia’s claim over West Papua, and rubberstamped at the United Nations by the US, the UK, Australia and their allies. The lands, forests and mountains that had been home to the Indigenous West Papuan people for 50,000 years were handed over to Indonesian President Suharto’s military regime – along with the vast reserves of gold, copper and natural gas buried beneath them.
Forty-eight years later, in January 2017, I’m sitting in a packed-out conference room in the UK Parliament building in Westminster. We are here to see West Papuan independence leader Benny Wenda launch a global petition, calling on the UN to oversee a fresh independence vote in his country to replace the sham referendum from 1969. Benny stands, ceremonial feathered headdress on his head, and tells the gathered MPs, journalists and supporters about the decades of human rights abuses his people have suffered under Indonesian occupation. His speech is accompanied by something I’ve never seen before – a video of demonstrations that took place in West Papua in the previous 24 hours, in solidarity with this meeting. We see groups of West Papuans in jungle villages holding up the Morning Star independence flag – a criminal act that carries a 15-year sentence in Indonesia – and thanking us for coming to Westminster today. One group of protesters have filmed themselves inside an Indonesian jail. Every participant in these actions will have done so at great personal risk of reprisal from the Indonesian military.
The people of West Papua are rising again, determined to reclaim the voice that was denied to them almost 50 years ago. After decades of struggle and brutal repression, recent events have propelled their fight for freedom back onto the world stage. If we’re serious about defending human rights and tackling climate change, this is the moment to stand with West Papua – the survival of an entire culture and the preservation of the world’s third-largest rainforest are hanging in the balance. But time is running out.”
The division between West Papua and the independent country of Papua New Guinea is an artificial line dating back to when
the British, Dutch and German empires colonized the island.
