Indonesia Govt to pay special attention to Papua`s development

Development in Indonesia`s easternmost province of Papua will be given special attention by the central government in the 2009-2014 period, Vice President- elect Boediono said here on Monday.

“I want to get first-hand information about the real conditions in Papua, especially in the Pegunungan Tengah and border areas, so that the central government can make the proper development plan for the province,” Boediono told newsmen during a stop-over at Mozes Kilangin airport here.

Boediono admitted that he had never been to Papua before, especially to remote areas which are difficult to reach by overland transportation. The vice president elect said that to speed up development in Papua`s remote areas, road infrastructures linking one place to another should be built. Besides building road infrastructures, he said, the central government would also encourage district and municipal administrations in the province to give special attention to development in the health and education sectors. He also scheduled to hold a meeting with nine district heads and Papua Governor Barnabas Suebu in the Jayawijaya district town of Wamena on Tuesday and Wednesday before proceeding to Tanah Merah in Boven Digoel district where he would dedicate the Sue seaport.

Meanwhile, Puncak Jaya district head Lukas Enembe expressed hope that the central government would build a road from Yuguru to Abema in one of Papua`s mountainous regions. The distance between Yuguru at the border of Mimika district and Asmat, and Abema in Jayawijaya district is about 140 kilometers, while the route between Jayapura and Wamena is about 500 kilometers. The road linking Jayapura and Wamena which has been under construction since the 1980s has yet to be completed because of treacherous and mountainous terrain. Lukas Enembe said the snail-paced development in the mountainous areas in Papua was due to lack of transportation facilities.

Source : ANTARA News | Timika | Papua

Mimika focuses on alleviating maternal mortality rate

Markus Makur

The Mimika regency administration is focusing on alleviating the maternal mortality rate in their 12 districts through the local health office, in line with the program initiated by the provincial administration to provide good health care for people in rural areas of Papua, be they in the mountainous, hinterland or southern areas of Papua. The program will be implemented in every regency across the province by sending teams to provide counseling, medical checkups and food supplements for expectant mothers in rural areas.

The health office has posted medical workers in rural areas and in 13 community health clinics in the 12 districts of Mimika. Medical awareness among pregnant women in Mimika regency remains very low despite the medical services provided by the clinics, so much so that Mimika is often regarded as lacking decent medical services.

Mimika Health Office head Erens Meokbun told reporters in Timika recently that medical workers often encountered obstacles in the field, such as from members of the community who refused to help themselves or those who were unaware of health care issues. Meokbun said as well as the drive to alleviate the maternal mortality rate by conducting routine medical checkups at the clinics in the 12 districts, the health office would also provide examinations for those infected with tuberculosis, malaria counseling and information on HIV/AIDS mitigation to people in villages.

“The teams from the health office are visiting villages and community health clinics to make the mobile clinic program across Papua a success by focusing on saving the lives of expectant mothers. The teams are currently working to provide medical checkups to pregnant women so their babies can grow and develop healthily,” he said.

The Health Ministry has allocated Rp 5 billion (about US$500,000) to pay for the mobile clinics across Papua including using assistance funds from the provincial and regency administrations. The provincial health office has proposed Rp 6 billion in supporting funds from the regency administration’s budgetary team in 2010. Meokbun said his office had distributed Jamkesmas health insurance cards to residents in rural areas. They will be exempted from paying medical bills when getting treatment in government-run hospitals and community health clinics.

When asked by reporters about the finding of malnutrition cases in Far East Mimika district, Meokbun confirmed five children in the Far East Mimika capital of Ayuka were suffering from malnutrition, and were currently being treated by a medical team.

Mimika’s medium-term development program (2009-2013), approved by the local legislature a week ago, included a number of development plans, such as improving human resources in Mimika by providing equal access to education in rural areas; realizing free education in state-run, as well as private, schools; and providing good services to the public, such as good health care to the people in the villages.

Mimika Regent Klemen Tinal said his office would exempt students in state-run schools in Mimika from paying school fees throughout the 2009 budget period. “If there are schools, from elementary to senior high school level, demanding school fees, they should return the money to parents because the government has exempted Papuan students from paying school fees. “I am very serious about improving education here, by providing education to every Papuan child in the rural areas of Mimika,” he said.

Source :   The Archipelago | Timika   |  Wed, 09/23/2009 |

Schools in Mimika interior closed for months

Tuesday, September 22, 2009
Academic activity at schools in Mimika district`s interior have been at a standstill for the past few months because their teachers have become stuck in Timika city, one of the teachers said.

The principal of Jila district`s junior high school (SMP), Natalis Nimbitkendik, said he and other teachers at his school were still in Timika because they had no transportation to return to Jila.

“We can not return to Jila, because there is no transportation to get there,” he said.
He said the teachers usually travel to Jila from Timika by a PT Freeport Indonesia helicopter hired by the Amungme and Kamoro Community Development Foundation (LPMAK).

Several villages in Jila district, such as Hoeya, Bela, Alama, Geselema and others are located 3,000 meters above sea level, and can only be reached by air transportation.

But since the shooting incidents in the concession area of gold and copper mining company PT Freeport, the company`s helicopters no longer fly to Jila district nor to Keakwa in Central East Mimika district.

Cantius Emereyauw, a Kamoro tribal community figure, said for the past three months YPPK`s Bona Ventura elementary school had totally stopped operating. The whereabouts of its teachers were also unknown.

“There has been no schooling activity in the past three months, because the teachers are not at their stations,” he said.

He said he was concerned about the pupils` future now that their schooling had been disrupted.

Elementary schools in Mimika which were run by the Catholic Education and School Foundation (YPKK) of Timika were also only operating now and then with casual teachers.

Meanwhile, the teachers with civil servant status were not around, and spending their time doing something else in the city, he said. Ironically, these teachers continued to receive their full salaries and allowances from the state.

The School Operational Assistance (BOS) funds the schools were receiving from the central or local governments were also being embezzled by the school principals with impunity.

“We urge Mimika`s local government through its relevant apparatus to pay serious attention to this situation,” Cantius said.

Source : Timika, Papua (ANTARA News)

PAPUA ONE OF THE NATURAL RESOURCES PROVINCE IN INDONESIA

Papua is one of Indonesia province comprising a majority part of the western half of New Guinea Island and nearby. The province originally covered the entire western half of New Guinea, but in 2003, the western portion of the province, on the Bird’s Head Peninsula, was declared in Jakarta as separate province named West Irian Jaya. The legality of this separation has been disputed, as it appears to conflict with the conditions of the Special Autonomy status awarded to Papua in the year 2000.

Papua is the official Indonesian and internationally recognized name for the province. During the colonial era the region was known as Dutch New Guinea. The province was known as West Irian or Irian Barat from 1969 to 1973, and then renamed Irian Jaya (“Victorious Irian”) by Soeharto. This was the official name until Papua was adopted in 2002. Today, natives of this province prefer to call themselves Papuans rather than Irianese. This may be due to etymology (variously identified as a real etymology or a folk etymology) the name of Irian, which stems from the acronym Ikut Republik Indonesia, Anti Nederland (join/follow with the Republic of Indonesia, rejecting The Netherlands). The name West Papua is used among Papuan separatists and usually refers to the whole of the Indonesian portion of New Guinea.

The capital of Papua province is Jayapura. Most of the population depends on subsistence farming, especially the cultivation of rice and maize. The main industries include copper (with the largest concentration of copper in the world at Tembagapura), palm oil, copra, maize, groundnuts, pepper, tuna, gold, oil, coal, and phosphates. It is mostly a mountainous and forested region, with the Maoke Mountain range rising to 5,029-m/16,499 ft at Jaya Peak. The population comprises Melanesians (original settlers of Western New Guinea), Papuans, Negritos, and Europeans. Indigenous animism prevails. The province declared independence from Indonesia, as West Papua, in June 2000. However, the president of Indonesia stated that the declaration was unrepresentative of true feeling in the province.

Regions
Indonesia structures regions contains of regencies and sub districts within those. Though names and areas of control of these regional structures can vary over time in accord with changing political and other requirements, in 2005 Papua province consisted of 19 regencies. The regencies are: Timika, Yapen – Waropen, Biak – Numfor, Nabire, Puncak Jaya, Paniai, Jayawijaya, Merauke, Sarmi, Keerom, Waropen, Tolikara, Yahukimo, Bintang Mountain, Boven Digoel, Mappi, Asmat, Supiori, and Jayapura. In addition to these, Jayapura city also has the status of regency. The people of the island can be divided into more than 250 subgroup, which are closely related to the islands along the southern rim of the Pacific and include among others, the Marindanim, Yah’ray, Asmat, Mandobo, Dani and Afyat. Those in the central highlands still maintain their customs and traditions and because of the terrain have virtually been untouched by outside influences. Communications hove always been difficult here and different tribes have lived, for the most part, in isolation even of each other, resulting in an incredibly diverse mixture of cultures

Government
Papua province has governed by a directly elected governor (currently Barnabas Suebu) and a regional legislature, DPRP (Dewan Perwakilan Rakyat Papua). A unique government organization that only exists in Papua is the MRP (Majelis Rakyat Papua / Papuan People’s Council) that was formed by the Indonesian Government in 2005 as a coalition of Papuan tribal chiefs, tasked with arbitration and speaking on behalf of Papuan tribal customs.

Ecology
A vital tropical rainforest with the tallest tropical trees and vast biodiversity, Papua’s known forest fauna includes marsupials (including possums, wallabies, tree-kangaroos, cuscuses), other mammals (including the endangered Long-beaked Echidna), many bird species (including birds of paradise, cassowaries, parrots, cockatoos), the world’s longest lizards (Papua monitor) and the world’s largest butterflies. The island has an estimated 16,000 species of plant, 124 genera of which are endemic.The extensive waterways and wetlands of Papua are also home to salt and freshwater crocodile, tree monitor, flying foxes, osprey, bats and other animals; while the equatorial glacier fields remain largely unexplored.

In February 2006, a team of scientists exploring the Foja Mountains, Sarmi, discovered numerous new species of birds, butterflies, amphibians, and plants, including a species of rhododendron, which may have the largest bloom of the genus. Ecological threats include logging-induced deforestation, forest conversion for plantation agriculture (especially oil palm), small holder agricultural conversion, the introduction and potential spread of non-native alien species such as the Crab-eating Macaque, which preys on and competes with indigenous species, the illegal species trade, and water pollution from oil and mining operations.

Geographically
A central East-West mountain range dominates the geography of New Guinea, over 1600 km in total length. The western section is around 600 km long and 100 km across. Steep mountains 3000 to 4000 m and up to 5000 m high along the range ensure a steady supply of rain from the tropical atmosphere. The tree line is around 4000 m elevation and the tallest peaks are snowbound year round.

Both North and West of the central ranges the land remains mountainous mostly 1000 to 2000 m high covered by thick rain forest and a warm humid year round climate. The third major habitat feature is the southeast lowlands with extensive wetlands stretching for hundreds of kilometers. It is a land of exceptional natural grandeur, with beautiful scenic beaches, immense stretches of marshlands, cool grassy meadows and powerful rivers carving gorges and tunnels through dark and dense primeval forests. The most heavily populated and cultivated parts of the island are the Paniai Lakes district and the Baliem Valley to the east.

Mamberamo River sometimes referred to the “Amazon of Papua” is the province’s largest river, which winds through the northern part of the province. The result is a large area of lakes and rivers known as the Lakes Plains region. The famous Baliem Valley, home of the Dani people is a tableland 1600 m above sea level in the midst of the central mountain range; Jaya Peak, sometimes known by its former Dutch name Carstensz Pyramid, is a mist covered limestone mountain peak 5030 m above sea level.