Marginalized Dayaks violently assert their rights

By Dini S. Djalal

JAKARTA (JP): Ethnic conflict is the accepted catchphrase to describe the ongoing clashes between the indigenous Dayaks and the migrant Madurese in West Kalimantan, which have reduced two dozen Madurese settlements to ashen rubble.

Indonesia's ambitious transmigration program, which resettles the very poor of Java and Madura to the outer provinces, is being blamed for the riots, and not without reason. Often arriving with little knowledge of their hosts' culture, the transmigrants expand the cultural divide by living in separate hamlets. Analysts advise that the Coordinating Body for National Unity (Bakom PKB) should focus not only on assimilating the ethnic Chinese, but also on acculturating migrant communities.

The cultural differences dividing the Dayaks and Madurese are indeed great. The Dayaks complain that the Madurese are quick to draw the knives they always carry -- itself an affront to Dayak adat (custom). Graffiti proclaiming "Madurese out" proves that ethnic friction does fuel the Dayaks' fury.

But theories of tribal enmity, along with assumptions of economic disparity between the Dayaks and Madurese, are shallow explanations of the fighting. Situating the conflict within the context of political economy, and its impact on traditional Dayak society, offers a clearer picture. "This movement must be seen in the context of tradition, and to the Dayaks, this is self- defense," said Pastor Heny Derksen of Pahauman.

After all, the more traditional groups are inflicting the most damage. Ethnic-based theorizing does not explain the fact that many Dayak warriors razing Madurese villages are from the interior, where there is less contact with Madurese. "Many Dayaks here don't have a problem with the Madurese," said Pastor Willy Yacob of Ngabang. "But the Dayaks from the interior view the Madurese as their enemies, because the Madurese often threaten their children studying in the cities," he said. This inward behavior reflects their education. In the upstream villages, the education level is still very low, with 84 percent of the population having only an elementary school education.

Pastor Yeremis of Menjalin parish, which saw 5,000 Dayak refugees during the peak of the violence, says that the Madurese are now scapegoats of pent-up Dayak anger. He explains that the Dayak, docile for many decades, are reacting to years of political, economic, and social marginalization. "The Dayaks are so gentle and generous, but they are also easily manipulated and used. This frustration is exploding now, and manifesting in their conflict with the Madurese," he said.

Angry Dayaks are sweeping down by the thousands from the Kapuas Hulu, Sambas, and Putussibao regencies by Malaysia's Sarawak border, crying war and injustice. Although more traditional than their southern kin, inland Dayak societies are still being eroded by government-led modernization. The famous communal longhouses have been replaced by single-family dwellings, simultaneously taking away the oral traditions, cultural cohesion, and political unity, of longhouse culture.

"The structures of their villages are being transformed. Their traditional leaders are coopted into becoming civil servants," said Pastor Yeremis.

Societal restructuring is not the only change modernization brings. As vital to the Dayaks, and to the unrest, is the stripping away of their traditional land for the interests of transmigrants and commercial plantations. "This is about land conflict," said Laurentius Kadir, a Dayak and head of the province's Directorate for Village Development. "What has to be done is more balanced development," he said.

Structural poverty

Structural poverty may be the core issue, but not economic inequity between the Dayaks and Madurese. Even the Dayaks themselves admit many Madurese are poor, although some transmigrants have prospered. More important than differences in economic status are the means by which some Madurese gained their wealth.

"Many Madurese are becak (three-wheel pedicab) drivers or construction workers. Sure, some are rich, but we're not jealous. What we don't like is the way they've gotten their land with government help," said a Dayak who requested anonymity.

Complaints of land conflict illustrate the relative poverty of the general population, whether Dayak, Madurese, or Javanese. Martinus, a Dayak man whose house in Kepayang was burned by angry Madurese said: "Some of the burned Madurese houses were very luxurious -- some of them cost Rp 20 million (US$8333)".

Martinus' family, now in hiding, exemplifies the Dayaks' increasing marginalization. Initially, the family had a lot of swidden land in the area. But during the 20-year fallow period traditional shifting cultivation requires, bit by bit their land was "borrowed", with government consent, by migrant Madurese. Lacking legal papers to their traditional land and confronted by laws which declare all uncertified land as state possessions, protests over land theft were often futile. "We resent the Madurese taking our land, but we also resent the government for not protecting our rights," said one Dayak.

The shrinking size of their traditional land has adversely affected not only community harmony but also local income. As land availability diminishes, Dayak farmers are forced to shorten their fallow period to five years, thus destroying the sustainability of the fragile ecosystem. West Kalimantan is now the island's poorest region, the land depleted of rich soil and replaced by alang-alang (parasitic weeds). Once a vast rain forest, the landscape has been transformed into unproductive savanna.

The loss of forest cover due to intensive farming and alang- alang has brought about abnormally long dry seasons. "West Kalimantan is facing severe environmental degradation. Previously, you had uncyclic dry periods every 100 years, now you can have dry periods of up to six months," said environmental scientist Frank Momberg, who spent a year conducting field research in West Kalimantan. Exceptionally long dry seasons also means forest fires, which halt economic activity. "The planes stop flying, the ships stop coming in because there is too much haze from the forest fires," said Momberg.

The Dayaks' progressive poverty is exacerbated, says Momberg, by the spread of palm oil and rubber plantations. Currently, 2.3 million hectares of land are allocated by the government for commercial plantations, making West Kalimantan Indonesia's second largest plantation area after Riau. Few Dayaks are involved in these projects.

In some cases, these projects do not even provide jobs for the Dayaks. Despite an annual export-led growth rate of 10.7 percent, West Kalimantan has a high local unemployment rate: 13 percent in 1995. "These projects have to stop bringing in labor from outside. They must hire Dayaks too," said Laurentius Kadir.

The big estates are making big money at the expense of radically transforming traditional Dayak economy. Historically, Dayak farming methods were "mutually supportive", alternating rice planting with commercial crops. The rice was harvested for subsistence, while the other crops, such as rubber and tengkawang (illipe nuts used for cosmetics), were traded for essential goods.

In the 1980s, the green revolution arrived, and with it a new orientation towards land. Offering credit of Rp 9 million per field, the International Body for Rubber Smallholder Development encouraged farmers to establish monoculture rubber plantations, which produced higher yields but required more labor. Many Dayaks then devoted more of their land to cash crops, leaving them with fewer subsistence crops and forcing them to buy additional rice.

To the Dayaks, increasing consumption meant more debt. The Dayak live by a barter system, and, forced by physical isolation from more just market forces, began to sell their crops at below- market prices.

Yet turning to rubber tapping at least safeguarded Dayak land and livelihood. "If managed well, you can get a good return on rubber," said Frank Momberg.

More damaging was the proliferation of palm oil estates. In the 1980s, Dayak communities across the province protested being forced to give up 25 hectares of their traditional land in compensation for only 2 hectares in palm oil plantation schemes -- land then handed over to transmigrants and commercial estates. In recent years the Dayaks have burned three plantations in protest of land appropriation.

The Dayaks complain that their interests would be better served with more Dayaks in government. Governor Aspar Aswin, they point out, is from Lampung, while many government officials are non-Dayak, despite the fact that the province is 51 percent Dayak. "There are even more Irianese in government in Irian Jaya than there are Dayaks in government in Kalimantan," said Frank Momberg.

"The Dayaks simply want more representation in parliament," said Pastor Yeremis.

But the quest for social justice is hindered by the perception that the few Dayaks in government, particularly those negotiating the peace process, represent the interests of big business.

"The Dayaks here feel they are treated unfairly. We have to sell our land cheaply. Is this justice?," said a Dayak.

Yet, as the Dayaks savagely assert their rights, a bigger question is whether brutality will recover the justice the marginalized Dayaks have lost.