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Wenda NZ visit exposes sensitivity over Papua
Radio New Zealand International - May 12, 2017
Benny Wenda visited New Zealand to meet MPs, Foreign Affairs officials, trade unionists and the general public to raise awareness about his homeland.
The international spokesman for the United Liberation Movement for West Papua, Benny Wenda fled the Indonesian-administered region of Papua, or West Papua, in 2003.
In recent years he's travelled widely from his British base to lobby international support for legitimate self-determination for West Papuans.
Questions around the legitimacy of the UN-sanctioned process by which the former Dutch New Guinea was incorporated into Indonesia in the 1960s have never really abated.
The problem of human rights abuses by security forces in Papua, recognised in part by Indonesia's government under President Joko Widodo, has informed a growing international solidarity movement.
However, Jakarta
says Indonesian sovereignty over Papua is final, and has rejected the legitimacy
of the Liberation Movement.
NZ parliamentarians
on board
But this week, after hearing from Mr Wenda, eleven MPs from four New Zealand political parties signed a declaration by the International Parliamentarians for West Papua.
This international organisation of MPs, which includes Britain's Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn, is calling for an internationally supervised self-determination vote in Papua. Mr Wenda said the cross-party New Zealand support was a sign of growing global solidarity.
"It's not one particular party but Labour, Greens, National (and Maori Party), they're all signing the declaration. So this is, they show that around the world this fight is about a humanitarian issue. People believe in justice and freedom."
Tellingly, while he was in Wellington, Mr Wenda was not required to provide background for a parliamentary select committee considering a petition calling for action by New Zealand's government on rights abuses in Papua.
Instead, he had a brief meeting at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs where officials politely heard his pleas for more action on Papua, then saw him on his way.
The government has appeared reluctant to push Jakarta too hard on Papua, even though it did mention concern at Indonesia's UN periodic human rights review this month.
Kelburn fracas
The sensitivity around West Papua was evident during Mr Wenda's time in Wellington. He participated in a protest march to the Indonesian embassy in Kelburn where demonstrators gathered in the rain to call loudly for West Papuan freedom.
Proceedings became tense after the embassy front door opened and an Indonesian official stepped out to meet the protest.
Firdauzie Dwiandika, a Minister Counsellor for Political Affairs, stood near where Mr Wenda and the New Zealand Green Party MP Catherine Delahunty addressed the crowd.
After listening for a while to the two, Mr Dwiandika told them they were wrong about human rights in Papua, and that people in Papua knew the truth.
"You can no longer hope that we will buy the story," Ms Delahunty retorted. "You have tried to marginalise these indigenous people, you have tried to lock them inside their border, you have starved their children, you have ignored their health crisis, you have taken their resources!"
But "Papua has changed," said Mr Dwiandika, ascending back up the steps to the embassy door.
It's rare to have an Indonesian official fronting at such protests, which themselves have become fairly frequent. Yet it's common for Indonesians to attend West Papua solidarity events, as was the case last night when Mr Wenda addressed a public meeting at Wellington's Victoria University.
One of the Indonesians in the crowd who repeatedly challenged Mr Wenda's take on the Papua situation felt compelled to leave as local students launched into a passionate haka.
The somewhat heated exchange demonstrated how deeply Maori and Pasifika students in particular have taken on the Papuan cause.
Trust issue
"There is zero trust between Jakarta and Papuans," Mr Wenda explained. Yet he admitted that Jokowi, as Indonesia's President is known, had spent far more time in Papua than previous Indonesian leaders.
Jokowi, who was in Papua this week inspecting new infrastructure projects, has shown commitment to his 2014 election promise to improve living conditions for Papuans.
"But the reality is, the governments are controlled by military," said Mr Wenda, "so the current president does not have power to change the situation in West Papua."
With the divisiveness of the Papua issue exposed, Mr Wenda flew out of New Zealand and on to the next stop on his seemingly never-ending global lobbying tour.
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