Monday, December 31, 2012

Kaleidoscope of Agrarian Conflicts 2012: A portrait of how the people's voices and rights are ignored.

Agrarian or resource conflicts are getting serious. Unclear land-use planning (including the designation of forest areas), along with the government's attitude which seems to allow these conflicts to happen, are only making the situation worse. Companies come in to inhabited lands, or land owned by local or indigenous people. Conflicts arise between the people, or between the people and the company or the state. More often than not, it's the people that lose out.

Points of friction keep on arising. Resource conflicts causing loss of life and property have continued all year long. Data from Walhi indicates that in 2011 there were 8307 agrarian conflicts, and 4302 cases that had been resolved.

Most conflicts occurred in West Sumatra with 883 cases, South Sulawesi with 780, West Java 749, Central Java 532, Bali 515, East Java 400, East Nusa Tenggara 335, North Sumatra 331, Banten 324 and East Kalimantan 242 cases. Here's just a small selection of the agrarian conflicts that occurred this year.

Friday, December 7, 2012

A Chronology of PT Minersave's (Freeport's) Entry into Intan Jaya Regency, West Papua.

This article from KOMISI, a group of students from Intan Jaya in West Papua (in co-operation with the Suara Papua website), recounts how the Freeport mining company, through its subsidaries, established exploration activities in remote Intan Jaya regency over twenty years ago with the help of a western missionary. Currently, as local politicians grant permissions for further exploration work without a mandate or the consent of the communities that live there, the students make a clear demand that the company leaves their land, knowing the pattern of conflict that is bound to emerge otherwise.