Tag Archives: Community Resistance

Three years of MIFEE (part 1): A Growing Movement Against Plantations in West Papua

“We, the indigenous people of Yowied Village reject corporations coming on to our land in Tubang District for the following reasons: there is not so much land around Yowied Village. Our lives are dependent on what our environment can provide. Where will the future generations go?” The sign is tied with coconut leaves, a signal […]

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Three Years of MIFEE (part 2): First Villages Feel the Impact as the Plantation Menace Spreads.

The forest villages of Merauke are as remote as it is possible to imagine in the twenty-first century. Nowhere in Indonesia is further from Jakarta – 3700 kilometres as the crow flies. 662 km of forest and a high mountain range separate Merauke from the Papuan capital, Jayapura, which is also the focus of most […]

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Ecological Annihilation in the Aru Islands.

[awasMIFEE note: this article is about a planned 500,000 hectare mega-plantation in the Aru Islands. Although they lie due south of West Papua, administratively they are part of Maluku Province. It was in Aru that Alfred Russell Wallace first observed the fauna which the archipelago shares with Papua – birds of paradise and marsupials such […]

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Update on Action at Mayora Office: Press Reports

An action at PT Mayora’s offices on Monday passed off peacefully. Marind people were protesting the company’s strategy of entering an area before developing proper plans, creating a climate of fear amongst the community. This fear had been heightened when the company had accused the people of being separatists and members of the OPM. Here’s […]

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Breaking News: Mayora and Astra Offices Occupied in Merauke.

Around 100 people from the SSUMAWOMA Malind Woyu Maklew Intellectual Forum are currently occupying PT Mayora and PT Astra’s company offices on Jalan Ternate, Merauke City. The occupation started at 11.00 local time, involving youth and community members from the Malind Muli Woyu Maklew sub-ethnic group, from villages such as Wamal, Dokib, Wambi, Dodalim and […]

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Mayora’s Latest Trick: Threatened with OPM stigma, Village Leaders Intimidated into Signing Document

Kampung Yowid, like other villages in Tubang and Ilwayab districts, has taken a determined and united stance against plantation companies, which have recently been moving in to the area. But now indigenous leaders in Kampung Yowid have been intimidated into signing a document from PT Mayora, one of Indonesia’s leading food brands, which is trying […]

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Marind Intellectuals Oppose Corporations

Over the last few months, a series of meetings have taken place in villages around Merauke to discuss development plans, within the framework of local adat, or customary law,. In each one, a resolution has been made, a clear rejection of all investment. The document below, from a new grouping of Marind intellectuals called FORMASI […]

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Domande Update: Villagers Order PT Rajawali to leave their Worksite

In the wake of the recent action by villagers from Kampung Domande, Malind District, Merauke Regency, to block PT Rajawali’s access, now the villagers have ordered company employees who were carrying out work on the land to leave. This means that their logging operations are still not progressing smoothly. When tabloidjubi.com met Djago Bukit, the […]

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Customary Landowners Block Access to PT Rajawali’s Land

The issue of PT Rajawali’s compensation to villagers in Kampung Domande, Merauke, has still not been resolved. The villagers, who are the customary landowners, have blocked access to around 10,000 hectares of the land which the company wants to use to plant sugar cane. When Tabloid Jubi met Efendi Kanan, the head of the forestry […]

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Sugar company Rajawali is destroying forest without permission in Malind district.

Merauke 15 April 2013, Without the knowledge or consent of local landowners in Kampung Onggari, Malind district, Merauke, two subsidiaries of the Rajawali Group, PT Karya Bumi Papua and PT Cenderawasi Jaya Mandiri, are destroying ancestral forest, evicting areas of importance and swamps belonging to the people. It is believed that this has been occurring […]

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