By : Soedibyo
Introduction
RADAR ACEH | The United Nations was holding its 71 st General Assembly in New York, from September 13nd to September 26th, 2016. As it had been expected long time before by the United Liberation Movement of West Papua (ULMWP) and the National Committee of West Papua (NCWP/KNPB) the two NGOs that were struggling for the Referendum of West Papua, ULMWP and NCWP have been considered to get support from Six Pacific Countries (Melanesian and Micronesian Countries) who demanded the UN to solve the problem of the Human Right violation in West Papua.
Solomon Islands (Melanesian country) said the solution fromHuman Right Violation in West Papua is important because the Referendum of West Papua and the Solution of the Human Right Violation in West Papua are the two faces of one West Papuan coin.
Because of the attitude of those six Pacific countries, the Indonesian Ambassador to the UN has likely made sharp counter statement in the UN General Assembly forum rejecting all those statement of those six Pacific countries accusing Indonesia is the country thathas committed to the human right violation in Papua.
The support of six Pacific Countries (one Melanesian countries and five Micronesian countries) and the exposing the issue on the Human Right Violation in Papua will definitely compensate the failure of ULMWP in the MSG Summit Meeting in Solomon in term of agitation and propaganda.
ULMWP failed to become full member of the MSG (Melanesian Spearhead Group) in the Summit Meeting of MSG in Solomon last July 2016.
Based on the support of six Pacific Countries it will definitely increase the activities of the United Liberation Movement of West Papua (ULMWP) and the National Committee of West Papua (NCWP/KNPB) in its agitation and propaganda to look for support of among the Papuan people.
However the Foreign Ministry Office of the Republic of Indonesia has to make also statement for the Papuan people that the support from those six Pacific countries to ULMWP and NCWP is meaningless.
The United Nations General Assembly Meeting.
Six Pacific Country leaders using different tone and statements had expressed their demands to the UN in responding the wish of the West Papuan NGO namely the ULMWP and NCWP concerning the self determination process and human right violation happened in Papua.
In general they express their sympathy to the struggle of the people of West Papua accordingly they seriously demanded the UN talk and to discus the matter with Indonesia to find the accepted solution of the matter. Being Melanesian it is likely only Solomons to talk in the hard tone in the Assembly.
Roughly those six representatives of those six Pacific countries said : first, Solomon said, The UN must act and find a workable solution to give autonomy to the Indigenous Peoples of West Papua. Solomon Islands is gravely concerned about the human rights violations against Melanesians in West Papua.
Human rights violations in West Papua and the pursuit for self-determination of West Papua are two faces of one Papuan coin.
Second, the representative of Marshall Island said and requested that the UN Human Rights Council initiate a credible and independent investigation of alleged human rights violations in West Papua"
Third, the representative of Nauru to the 71 th UN Assembly said, Nauru is deeply concerned regarding the situation in West Papua, including the alleged human rights abuses.
As emphasized in the Pacific Islands Forum Statements, it is important that there will be an open and constructive dialogue with Indonesia on this matter.
Fourth, Vanuatu representative to 71 th UM 71 UN said that Vanuatu urged the United Nations to take concrete measures to address human rights concerns in West Papua.
Fifth, the representative of the Republic of Palau to the 71 the UN Assembly said the Republic of Palau join others to advocate for an amenable resolution to the problem in West Papua.
Definitely being the Melanesian, Solomon spoke strongly to express her statement concerning the problem submitted by the Papuan NGO, namely the ULMWP. Solomon is the Chairman of the Melanesian Spearhead Group (MSG).
Meanwhile the other Representative of Pacific Countries which do not belong to Melanesian tend to talk softly. The countries of the world tend to avoid making comment on the issue on Referendum because the issue on Referendum is clearly crucial and sensitive issue due to its close character to the sovereignty of a certain country.
The member of the UN are 193 countries, the only six countries supported ULMWP and NCWP are definitely small and as mention by the Indonesian Ambassador to the UN is meaningless.
The Historical Record of the Papuan Problem.
The Region of Papua that is now becoming the Province of West Papua (Manokwari) and the Province of Papua (Jayapura) were founded through the democratic process as the result of the Act of the Free Choice of Papua in the year of 1969 based on the New York Agreement between The Republic of Indonesia and the Dutch Kingdom in 1962. The Act of the Free Choice of Papua as the modification of Referendum of Papua was held in 1969 to be based on the principle of One Tribe One Vote held, supervised and controlled by The United Nations Temporary Executive Authority (UNTEA).
UNTEA was the Representative of the United Nations, consisting of a number of the UN Officials who were staying in Papua for several months preparing the Act of the Free Choice. The right to vote is represented by the leaders of the existing Tribes.
The result of the votes was indicating that the Papuan decided their choice declaring that the Region of Papua to become a part of the territory of The Republic of Indonesia. This result approved and officially reported by UNTEA to the UN Headquarters in New York.
The United Nations that was founded after The World War Two had been respected and trusted as the World Organization that was founded based on Peace, Freedom, respecting Human Right, Justice, Coordination and Cooperation so that all the members of the UN should respect all the decision approved by the General Assembly of the UN. Officially the decision of the UN General Assembly to be based on the decision made by the UN Security Council .
Now after almost 50 years time-- a number of Papuan people demanded the United Nations to make a decision declaring Papua is one of the autonomous Territories in the World and to have the right to decide its status through the Referendum.
The UN will definitely reject the demand, because the Region of Papua had been a part of the Indonesian territory, so that the Region of Papua was not an autonomous Territory, but it had been a part of the Independent State of The Republic of Indonesia.
So why do a number of Papuan still talk about Referendum and Independence of the Region of Papua. Likely we should look back to the World history, namely the ending of the Ideological Warfare as the impact of the end of the Cold War had been likely followed by the rises of the NGO beside the Political Parties in all of the countries in the world. The confrontation among groups in the world changed. The confrontation among various NGO apparently marked the Proxy War among various interest of various groups in the world, replacing the Cold War between the United States Block Countries and the Soviet Union Block Countries.
The demand of a group of Papuan to the UN in order to declare the Region of Papua to be an autonomous Country so that the Indigenous people of the Region of Papua likely intend to create Papua as the independent country separated from the Republic of Indonesia. But we should remember that the Republicof Indonesia has been doing and will keep doing as much as possible for the benefit of Papua people while Dutch who has colonized Papua almost 350 years to have done nothing to change Papua as the backward country to become advance country similar to the neighboring countries such as the Eastern part of Maluku, Papua New Guinea, Solomon and other advance countries in the South West of Pacific.
So it is clear the problem faced by the Region of Papua is not the problem that should be solved by Referendum, but the problem of Papua is to develop the region to become advance and modern region.
The Special Development of Papua.
Historically the world culture had developed and the difference concerning human life and the people interest, and conflict had embarked to dispute and confrontation. This situation likely could be solved only by the better life of the people. It is predicted the situation of Papua was also in fact resulted by the demand for the better life among the people include those young generation who have realize that the World now is modern life and culture.
As the conclusion, the present generation who are complaining about their life demanding for the better conditions because the former generation never to think about those young generation that would be born and asking for the better life.
The members of ULMWP or NCWP/LNPB are definitely young generation and they are demanding for autonomous status of the Region of Papua and ask the United Nations for Referendum of the Region of Papua. They want to modernize Papua, but they should know demanding autonomous status of Papuan Teritorty andf to hold the Referendum to become independent Papua are not definitely the way to reach the Papuan prosperity.
Do not they ask their own heart that some day the new generation after them will come and those new generation also raise their demand the same issue as they are doing now, if the Papuan situation and condition is still the same such as it is now.
All young people the members of ULMWP, NCWP and other progressive NGO should think that now is the time to develop Papua so the new generation who will be born in Papua will not demand the old generation to leave Papua, because the Region of Papua is only for them as the next generation of Papua.
Accordingly now it is the time to develop Papua and the Government of the Republic of Indonesia the independent country that Papua belong to, to be ready to support to develop Papua or more The present generation of Papua should stop their adventurer everywhere bringing weapon in the jungle, in the mountain and in the hill as combatant or playing politics exploiting the word human right to attack their own Country and their own Government.
The Government of The Republic of Indonesia regularly changed and they have no interest on Papua because when their term finished Papua will be still there never to move everywhere in the Pacific or other ocean.
The Government of the Republic of Indonesia is just wanting the present generation of Papua to develop their ability in order to develop their capability to develop Papua.
The Government of the Republic of Indonesia has not any interest on the development of Papua, but to modernize Papua so the next Papuan generation will not complaining to the present generation as did nothing, but demonstration, quarreling and fighting with the security guards and then tried to go to the UN to convey their protest and complaining as if they were treated with cruelty and hard treatment by the Police of his country.
The main idea of this remarks is just based on the true and genuine heart feeling of all the Government apparatus of Indonesia, the Government genuinely expects all the young Papuan generation of now, members of the ULMWP or the NCWP to stop their opposition activities and asked to develop Papua and The Government of Indonesia is ready to support the framework of supporting the Papuan to develop Papua based on the Law on The Special Development Program of Papua.
Now the present generation accuses the Government as commits to Human Right Violation, it is not true because the new generation of Papua utilized its freedom movement, to express the people right for moving, speaking and expressing their attitude with sharp, rude and radical attitude. Of course that kind of activities could provoke also strong and hard response of the security apparatus professionally to prevent strongly in order not to become riot and chaos.
Radicalism definitely is not a culture, but if it is sometime used by the security personnel as a mean to cope with the situation because the mass demonstration is too rude and hard.
The most important thing to be expected by the government is certainly quarreling and fighting between those young generation against the security apparatus will never happen again either on the street or in the security investigation and detection.
The author is Papua issues observer. Residing in Jakarta.
