Marginalization in Maluku

Marginalization in Maluku

I read the opinion article by Angelique L. Pauline van Engelen
and Harley Saimima on the cause of the conflict now flaring in
Maluku, which The Jakarta Post published on page 5 under the
title The seeds of discontent in the beautiful Maluku islands in
its July 20, issue, and have been prompted to comment on it.

The two writers have blamed the resettlement project as the
root cause of the Maluku conflict. They point to the fact that
thousands of newcomers have been resettled separately from the
local people, many of whom have had their plots of land
forcefully seized for these resettled people. The presence of
these newcomers and the election of the heads of new villages
opened up for them have been seen as an attempt to Javanize the
area.

While this opinion may be correct in some respects, the
statistical data available tell a different story. For about 30
years -- six 5-year development periods -- as many as 22,799
families or 90,982 people were resettled in four regencies. This
number was less than 5 percent of the total population of the
province of Maluku in 1999. Most of them were resettled in
Central Maluku (13,140 families or 52,548 people, i.e. about 7.99
percent of the population in Central Maluku in 1999). The main
resettlement areas are located on Buru Island and North Seram
Island.

The question is whether the presence of newcomers numbering
only about 5 percent of Maluku population can cause turmoil
throughout the entire Maluku province. Up to 1996 most of these
newcomers were still poor and as evidence of their poverty, none
of those going for the haj pilgrimage this year came from Buru
Island. On the other hand, according to Kompas (June 19), the
number of refugees from Maluku now in Buton regency (Southeast
Sulawesi) is now recorded at some 107,000 people. Our own survey
in Buton (January 2000) reveals that 53 percent of these refugees
have come from Ambon City and 44 percent of them from Central
Maluku regency.

The number of people with Buginese, Buton and Muna (BBM)
ethnic background made up some 35 percent of the population of
Ambon City in 1998 and 15 percent of the population in Central
Maluku. People of BBM ethnic background dominate the modern
sector (trade) in Ambon City and it is for this reason that
rioting first broke out in Ambon and not on Buru Island or other
places.

Development and modernization always have structural
differentiation and cultural secularization as their attendant
consequences. Structural differentiation takes place alongside
functional specialization and turns religious elders previously
playing multiple roles into the singular role of prayer leader.

Cultural secularization is a phenomenon followed by
monetization and commercialization. In Maluku this phenomenon is
evident from the presence of large-scale businesses comprising
not only the Agency for Clove Marketing and Bufferstock (BPPC)
headed by Tommy Soeharto, but also business lines owned by
tycoons in forestry, agribusiness, mining and fisheries along
with their supporting service enterprises such as the banking,
insurance and marketing sectors. These companies bring with them
managers from Jakarta. Local people cannot fill higher management
positions because of their lack of education and experience. As
most of the locals are not interested to take lower positions,
these companies recruit people from Java or perhaps from among
the resettled people in Maluku to be employed as ordinary
employees, such as security guards. As a result, local people
have been more marginalized than before.

M. IKHSAN

Jakarta