John McBeth, Jakarta – Indonesian officials can be excused for feeling just a little outraged over the US House of Representatives passing legislation that implicitly questions the status of the resource-rich province of Papua.

Even if the provisions relating to Papua in the House 2006-2007 Foreign Relations Authorisation Act are quick to make clear that 'the US supports the territorial integrity of Indonesia', there can hardly be a clearer case of interference in another country's internal affairs.

The section calls on the US secretary of state to submit to Congress a report detailing the extent to which the Indonesian government has implemented special autonomy for Papua, including whether the territory has enjoyed an increase in revenue allocations and decision-making authority.

The Bill is serving as a rude wake-up call for an Indonesian government that has done virtually nothing to implement the 2001 Special Autonomy Law for Papua – intended to allocate a greater share of revenues and more decision-making authority to the provincial administration.

The latter piece of legislation has been undermined by conflicting legal directives, which have now divided the region into two separate provinces – Papua and West Irian Jaya – without the required consent of the provincial authorities.

Listen to the call of Papuan Tribal Council secretary Fadel Al-Hamid as officials began to digest the fallout from the US Bill. 'The signs are clear,' he told Jakarta. 'Don't take us for granted. If the government wants to rule on anything concerning Papua, involve us and hear our opinion. Have respect for us.'

It is a call that has long been ignored. Even if the US legislation is watered down in subsequent conference negotiations between the House and the Senate – and the Indonesians are moving swiftly with their lobbying efforts to try to make that happen – it has achieved something that has never been done before: It has, after years of trying, elevated the issue to a level of institutional expression on the international stage that forces Jakarta to pay attention.

For decades, particularly during the 32-year rule of Suharto, the central government was accused of plundering the rich natural resources of the largely road-less province while ignoring economic development and glossing over human rights abuses.

Papua is 1 1/2 times larger than the overcrowded island of Java with a population of only two million, half of them living in the rugged central highlands.

Recently, leaders of the tribal council met a sympathetic Vice-President Jusuf Kalla, the architect of the Aceh peace accord, seeking a re-evaluation of government policy towards Papua – one of a string of similar demands that have so far fallen on deaf ears.

Said Mr La Ode Ida, a member of the Regional Representatives Council, Indonesia's Upper House: 'The government has ignored all requests for a national dialogue with Papuans on ongoing economic injustice and poor law enforcement. Are we going to wait until we have another Aceh?'

Wake-up call

If Jakarta fails to respond by Monday, the council has threatened to symbolically hand back special autonomy to the central government – a move which would further fuel international debate and embarrass President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono on the day the government is due to sign a peace accord with the Free Aceh Movement in Helsinki.

'This is definitely a wake-up call,' said Mr Marzuki Darusman, a member of the House commission for security and international affairs. 'The most urgent thing is for the government to instil a sense of fairness and justice among the Papuan people.'

The Papua provision in the US Bill was championed by non-voting American Samoa congressional delegate Eni Faleomavaega, who relied on the crucial backing of New Jersey Democrat Donald Payne, an influential member of the congressional Black Caucus. Bipartisan support also came from two House heavyweights - Mr Henry Hyde, the Republican chairman of the House International Relations Committee, and his Iowa colleague Jim Leach, chairman of the Asia and Pacific affairs sub-committee.

Mr Faleomavaega told the House last month that the special autonomy law 'is worth nothing but the paper it is written on – a sham, a complete farce'.

He pointed to four key measures which have yet to be implemented, including the failure so far to form a Papua People's Council. 'We cannot allow the repeat of history,' he said. 'Rather, we must work to ensure that the central government acts in concert with the needs of the indigenous people of Papua.'

Although the Bill recognises the 'remarkable' progress Indonesia has made in democratisation and decentralisation, it has harsh words for the track record of successive Indonesian governments on Papua.

'While the US supports the territorial integrity of Indonesia,' it says, 'Indonesia's historical reliance on force for the maintenance of control has been counterproductive, and long-standing abuses by security forces have galvanised independence sentiments among many Papuans.'

However, by calling into question the 1969 Act of Free Choice, the United Nations-supervised plebiscite in which 1,025 hand-picked Papuan elders voted unanimously to join Indonesia, the Bill appears to be taking a contradictory stance on the issue of Indonesian sovereignty. Why else, for example, does the legislation specifically call on the secretary of state to provide an analysis of the plebiscite within the next 180 days? And what will be done with it?

The provisions which are more understandable are those with a distinct human-rights orientation:

• Those which compel the secretary to provide assessments of the extent to which Papua has enjoyed an increase in decision-making authority.
• The access provided to the press and non-governmental organisations.
• The role played by local civil society groups in governance.
• The force levels and conduct of the Indonesian security forces in the province.

Vanishing revenues

Revenue distribution between Jakarta and the province is probably the main bone of contention.

Thanks to sustained high mineral prices, Papua-based copper and gold miner Freeport Indonesia is expected to pay taxes and royalties of nearly US$1 billion (S$1.65 billion) to the central government this year, three times more than normal.

Yet under current laws, barely US$65 million will go to Papua. And even then, there are serious doubts that the province will get the full amount from the notoriously tight-fisted finance ministry.

Papuan leaders have long complained that the government spends more time and money on security than trying to address the root causes of long-simmering unrest, which human-rights groups claim has cost the lives of 100,000 Papuans over the past three decades.

The military is currently raising a third army strategic reserve division to be headquartered in the West Irian Jaya port city of Sorong. The other two divisions, which form the backbone of the army's combat force, have their headquarters in East Java and Jakarta.

Western military sources say there are currently only 5,000 troops in Papua, including four non-organic battalions along the Papua New Guinea border, compared with 30,000 in westernmost Aceh.

But the main point of concern is that most of the recruits for the second of two brigades will reportedly come from South Sulawesi- a predominantly Muslim province – who will be deployed in an area where there is now a delicate balance between Muslim settlers and an indigenous Papuan population made up mostly of Christians.

Although not linked by road, Sorong is the logistics centre for petroleum company BP's new Tangguh gasfield, which will add significantly to West Irian Jaya's coffers when it goes into production in 2008.

At least one of the new division's infantry battalions will be stationed in Timika, the sprawling town on Papua's southern coast that relies on the nearby Freeport mine for its sustenance. Troops have been guarding the operation since the mid-1990s.

The navy also recently announced plans to create a third fleet based out of Sorong, part of a major shake-up of its forces which will see the Jakarta-based western fleet moving to Sumatra's Riau province and the eastern fleet shifting its headquarters from the East Java port city of Surabaya to Makassar.

But the move, part of an overall government strategy to secure Indonesia's natural resources and strengthen its sovereignty over the far-flung reaches of the archipelago, worries critics.

As with the separatist struggle in Aceh, half-hearted policies dependent on a security approach, and without political will and concerted inter-departmental coordination, have never solved anything. They only make the situation worse.