Jayapura, Jubi – The planed transmigration program in Papua proposed by Minister of Rural, Remote Development Area and Transmigration, Marwan Jafar, is a demographic threat to indigenous Papuans, warned Papua Governor Lukas Enembe. “We have rejected this Central Government’s program. If they are still put it into their agenda, it should be the local transmigration instead of sending people from Java or other regions to Papua,” Enembe said on last week. “Replacing poor people to Papua means to bring problems to Papua. It would not only bring the economic, employment of social problems, but I am worried that the transmigration would demolish the population of indigenous Papuans. I am afraid that within ten to twenty years the indigenous Papuans would disappear from this land,” Enembe told Jubi at the Governor’s Official Resident in Jayapura on Saturday evening (17/10/2015). The governor said until now no party has the accurate data about the number of indigenous Papuans in Papua. So how to protect the indigenous Papuans of the transmigration program is still continued without any data on the population of indigenous Papuans? “We are still struggling with some issues of education, health, infrastructure and empowerment of indigenous Papuans. The transmigration would add the problem faced by the local government. Moreover if those who brought in are people without expertise thus it would not give benefit to the development in this land,” said Enembe. In the early September, the Minister Marwan Jafar demonstrated his attitude to opposite the statement of the President Indonesia, Joko Widodo about to stop the transmigration program in Papua. Instead of support the president’s statement; he made his statement to expand the transmigration program in Papua. He said the program of sending poor people from the crowd area to less population area who also provided with cash and land has been proven to be “success” in Merauke. “Merauke could be regarded as the border area that has been successful in implementing the transmigration and agricultural development program in the eastern Indonesia,” Marwan told reporters in Jakarta. He added Merauke is “the heaven for transmigrants”. He predicted that 275 thousand people have been moved to Merauke since Indonesia’s annexation towards West Papua in 1969. He said the transmigration program would increase the production as well as support the government’s plan to develop 1.2 million hectares of paddy fields in Merauke under the Merauke Integrated Rice Estate (MIRE) Project. (Victor Mambor/rom)
