Relief aid reaches starving Papuans in remote regency
Nethy Dharma Somba, The Jakarta Post, Jayapura
Aid began arriving in a remote area of Papua on Sunday after bad weather prevented food and medicine from reaching starving Papuans on Saturday, while the health minister denied any cases of malnutrition had been detected in Yahukimo regency.
Carried aboard Army helicopters, the aid was unloaded in Sumantanto, the capital of Yahukimo regency. The operation was overseen by Coordinating Minister for People's Welfare Aburizal Bakrie and other ministers, Antara news agency reported.
Meanwhile in the city of Wamena, several Cessna aircraft belonging to missionary groups and two helicopters belonging to the Army and PT Freeport Indonesia have been deployed to carry food, medical supplies and health workers to famine-stricken areas in Yahukimo.
The failure of the recent sweet potato crop has been blamed for the spread of famine in the mountainous regency of 55,000 people. The regency can only be reached by aircraft and food aid, medicine and blankets have been stranded in Wamena, the nearest large town to Yahukimo, for the last several days.
But Papuan leaders have blamed the local and central governments for ignoring their people, leading to the famine. They say this tragedy is evidence the huge sums of money flowing into the province under regional autonomy have only benefited the elite of Papua.
Yahukimo Regent Ones Pahabol, who made news of the famine public by alerting the media that at least 55 people in the regency had died of malnutrition and 112 others had fallen sick from related illnesses since November, declined to answer questions on Sunday.
According to the head of Yahukimo's health office, Jacobus Mari, most residents in famine-affected areas were showing symptoms of malnutrition, as well as suffering from tuberculosis, malaria and skin conditions.
He said a medical team of 10 doctors was scheduled for deployment to Yahukimo from neighboring regencies. "The medical team will be leaving on Monday, if the weather permits," he told The Jakarta Post on Sunday.
President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono ordered officials on Friday to ensure the immediate disbursement of food and medicine to the regency, ordering Aburizal to investigate the causes of the famine and determine what needed to be done to help the people of Yahukimo. He also warned local leaders in Papua that they would be held accountable for allowing this tragedy to occur.
Meanwhile, contrary to previous reports and despite the ongoing aid efforts, Minister of Health Siti Fadilah Supari said there were no signs of starvation in Yahukimo and no evidence that 55 people had died of malnutrition in the regency.
Speaking in Jombang, East Java, on Sunday, she said a medical team had been deployed to the regency but found no evidence of starvation, Antara reported.
"There are sick children but not because of starvation. The 55 people who (reportedly) died, maybe that was an accumulative figure," she said during a ceremony to mark the opening of the Nahdlatul Ulama Sayyid Abdurrahman Medical Center in Mojoagung, Jombang.
She said there were people in Yahukimo who were sick, but they were not suffering from malnutrition. She added that the people who were ill were receiving treatment at a hospital in Wamena.
Apart from medicine, she said the ministry had also provided food and drinks for the people being treated at the Wamena hospital, as well as sending medical supplies to Yahukimo.
"We have been monitoring the situation for the last six months because if we waited for local government there might be more victims," she said.