Indigenous people get a chance to talk

By Samsudin Berlian

JAKARTA (JP): Following the collapse of Soeharto's authoritarian regime, various social groups across the country have publicly voiced their grievances, criticism and hopes.

At the latest count, 58 new political parties have been set up, not just in a bid for political power but to tell people and the elite about their aspirations.

But one group -- or more correctly hundreds of small groups usually lumped together in the fluid term "indigenous people" -- seemed to have remained in obscurity. Until last week that is when the United Nations (UN) gave them a forum to voice their views on their own situation.

The UN Development Program (UNDP) and UNESCO jointly organized a one-day workshop on indigenous people, themed "Partnership in Action," last Thursday to commemorate the International Day of the World's Indigenous People, that falls on Aug. 9.

Eight tribal leaders, as well as anthropologists and non- governmental organization (NGO) activists from all over the country, were invited to talk. The event was not a comprehensive study on all indigenous groups in Indonesia, but it offered a mixture of tribes from eastern to western parts of the country, from highlanders to sea people, and from tribal leaders familiar with the modern world to those who could not even speak Indonesian.

Likewise the leaders presented a potpourri of views, ranging from simple "We Need" messages to in-depth discussions on land rights for tribal people. Instead of dealing with general issues of indigenous people, the workshop debated the specific cases the tribal chiefs presented first-hand.

But even the simplest message uttered in a broken speech contained valuable lessons, if listened to with empathy. A leader of the Anak Dalam tribe who live in the jungles of southern Sumatra, for example, told the workshop participants: "We need television" -- a seemingly selfish wish of a tribe coveting glittering things they did not need.

But a deeper probe revealed that a group of transmigrants lived near their homeland. These newcomers owned a television set and refused to let the tribal people watch it with them. Suddenly the whole thing was put in a new light: tensions between the tribe and the transmigrants.

From Nias, an island to the west of North Sumatra, came a message of economic hardship. A plague killed thousands of pigs and forced the people to substitute pigs, ever important in traditional ceremonies, with eggs and not-so-traditional instant noodles.

A more in-depth analysis came from Umbu Ndena Billi of Sumba Island, 1,500 km east of Jakarta, who said the development policies under Soeharto destroyed the vitality of indigenous people.

Government-appointed village heads often ruled without clear understanding of the indigenous people's needs, thereby creating tension and dissent. At the same time, tribal lands were taken away and the land given to favored companies.

In addition, Billi said: "Our children whom we send away to study, when they have succeeded, become bureaucrats who are against us because they have to obey the existing system of governance."

He demanded indigenous people be given a greater say in economic development and more freedom to run their own "internal affairs", such as the freedom to implement traditional laws.

Abud Paus-Paus, a "raja" (king) who rules over six tribes on the rocky Arguni island off the northwestern coast of Irian Jaya, called for the government and aid communities to help establish a basic system for education and health care, as well as to provide clean water.

Chief Wesakin Asso of the Dani tribe from the Baliem Valley in Irian Jaya, famous for their artistic wood carvings, delighted the audience with his speech in the Dani language and appropriately called for protection of their traditional culture against the influx of newcomers and global culture.

"We need a minimuseum," he said, "to host sacred tribal treasures." Thieves have apparently stolen many antique artifacts and sold them cheaply as souvenirs.

Savitri Dyah, a researcher at the National Institute of Sciences (LIPI), said that capability discrepancies between indigenous people and newcomers in the Baliem Valley created social tensions between them, making the area prone to ethnic conflicts.

The Dani people were under pressure to sell their land as the only means to get cash to function in a market economy they were not familiar with. Since all their lands were communal lands, this had created tension between the elders and young people.

From Kalimantan, Tumenggung Luansa of the Iban Tribe asked the government to stop taking away their tribal lands to give to timber companies. "Tribal leaders often did not even know that their lands had been taken," he said.

He urged the government to include Dayak leaders in decision- making about their lands. Dayak is the name given to some 400 ethno-linguistically related groups in Kalimantan.

Stepanus Djuweng, director of the Pontianak-based Institute of Dayakology Research and Development, blamed the government for its failure to recognize the existence of indigenous people, calling them isolated communities, instead. The Ministry of Social Services has identified 1.1 million members of isolated communities living in 18 provinces in the country.

Djuweng said education -- supposed to help students open their minds and broaden their horizons -- had become a means of indoctrination to make Dayak children sneer at their own culture. Moslem and Christian missionaries also looked down at Dayak culture, he said.

The government treated the Dayak with contempt, he said, and sought to destroy their communal homes, the "Long Houses", the pillar of Dayak communities, arguing that such houses were used for prostitution. Moreover, their forests, their source of living, were taken from them, he added.

Djuweng said indigenous people did not need development, not even sustainable development. His reason is that development is another name for unacceptable global capitalism and that development is incompatible with sustainability. So, there is no such thing as sustainable development. What they needed, he said, was empowerment for sustainability, sustainability being freedom from development.

Djuweng's interesting concept is that while modern men always want "to own", indigenous people want "to be". They are happy not because they own anything but because there are just like fish in the river, animals in the forest, trees bearing fruit, and mountains staying where they are.

However, the "We Need" list that the tribal leaders brought to the workshop may be proof that such a concept is too idealistic and that in today's small world, compromises have to be made between "to own" and "to be".

Noted historian Onghokham said in the workshop that no tribe or anybody in the world could avoid internationalization or globalization, and that invariably, in the meeting between global and local cultures, traditional rights of local peoples tended to disappear. "It is the duty of governments," he said, "to pay attention to the peoples' rights."

"The right to development is the right of all peoples," said the UNDP's acting resident representative, Anne-Birgitte Albrectsen, explaining the UN's position on the issue.

The UN declared 1995/2004 as the International Decade of the World's Indigenous People and pledged to improve their conditions in such areas as human rights, the environment, development, education and health.

It believes indigenous peoples must be empowered to make choices that would enable them to maintain their cultural identity while participating in national economic and social life.

The writer is a member of staff at the UNDP in Jakarta. This article was written in his personal capacity.