EU to help refugees in Maluku
Muhammad Azis Tunny, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta
The European Union (EU) will donate funds to help refugees in Maluku and North Maluku to return home or resettle to other areas.
The funds will be disbursed soon after the two provinces submit their proposal to the EU headquarters in Belgium, said a local official.
Ambon mayor M.J. Papilaya said on Saturday that the proposal would be submitted before June 27, and the funds would be around three million euros to help both provinces handle the refugees.
"This is the result of a visit of several EU ambassadors to the city on Sept. 8, 2003. According to unofficial information from the UK, the aid is only the first stage," said Papilaya.
He added that a staffer at EU would assist officials of the two provinces in preparing the proposal so that it would meet EU standards. This staff member will take it to the EU headquarters before June 27.
Papilaja expressed optimism that the EU would disburse funds to both provinces, which were rocked by sectarian conflicts.
Tens of thousands of Muslims and Christians were killed in the sectarian conflict that began in 1999, and hundreds of thousands of others fled to other provinces in Indonesia for fear that they might become victims of the conflict.
The conflict subsided last year, but tough tasks await, while local people and the government of the two provinces are bracing themselves for postconflict rehabilitation.
Papilaja said that the EU ambassadors had acknowledged that the conflict had impinged on the lives of Maluku and North Maluku people, and they deserved foreign aid.
Aside from that, he cited another factor that had compelled the EU to disburse funds to the two provinces.
"Ambon already had contact and social and economic cooperation with Vlisingen province in the Netherlands. This is an advantage for us, because the EU requires that a foreign province has to have relations or cooperation with a province in the EU, in order to be eligible for EU aid," said Papilaja.
Separately, Governor of Maluku Karel Albert Ralahalu acknowledged that the local government still had to deal with 36,000 refugee families in the province.
He said that the province would not shoulder the burden alone, because the Ministry of Social Affairs had released a planned project list (DIP) recently, covering 10,000 refuge families.
"However, we must keep on working to handle the remaining 26,000 families," he said.
Karel will meet with the minister of finance on April 5 to discuss the disbursement of postconflict recovery funds for both Maluku and North Maluku.
As stipulated by Special Presidential Instruction No. 6/2003, Maluku and North Maluku, two conflict areas in Indonesia, are entitled to the funds. The total amount allocated to the province for 2004 is Rp 1,02 trillion (US$1.2 billion).
"After the meeting, we hope the funds will be disbursed as soon as possible because both provinces need the funds badly for reconstruction and rehabilitation in the postconflict situation," Karel said.