Papua and Neglect on the Conflict-Development Nexus

The killing by armed criminal groups (KKBs) of eight employees of a telecommunications company, including the son of a tribal chief, and the stabbing of a worker at a construction project for social services house in Intan Jaya have only blurred the image of the conflicts in Papua.

Since the government declared KKBs as terrorists in April 2021, violent incidents and armed conflicts have been steadily on the rise.

There are three important things to note. First is whether conflicts have been handled appropriately from the aspect of security strategy. Second, why KKBs have improved in their tactical skills even though they are not large in number. Third, what are the prospects of version 2 of the Special Autonomy (Otsus) Law in terms of creating order in Papua?

Conceptually, the efforts to deal with the complexities of Papua need to be based on the nexus between conflicts and development. In a nexus analysis, the connections and relations of causality between the structure and synergy of conflict and development are analyzed. According to the dataset on the areas and incidences of armed conflict processed by the Centre for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) Jakarta, conflicts in Papua are escalating.

In 2015, there were 91 cases of vertical and horizontal conflicts. In 2019, the figure increased to 152 cases and in 2021, there were as many as 319 cases. Analysis showed that conflicts involving KKBs also increased sharply in the number of incidents.

In 2015, there were also 11 cases of violent events, 37 cases in 2019 and 139 cases in 2021.

Reviewing the security strategy

Considering the increase in the number of conflicts, is the existing security strategy appropriate? The argument raised against imposing a civil or military emergency in Papua by Coordinating Political, Legal and Security Affairs Minister Mahfud M.D. has sparked controversy.

Mahfud stated that there was no need to impose a civil or military emergency in Papua because the issue of terror in Papua was not large, as the terrorists were easily identifiable and were fragmented in separatist groups.

The government extending an invitation for dialogue to them and taking legal action against hardliners were also just a slogan.

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His statement seems to simplify the security strategy. If this strategy implemented, it would be less effective in light of the escalation in conflicts. In tackling this issue, the effectiveness of a security strategy can be based on the analysis, “Life-Cycle of a Conflict” (Mashatt, Long and Crum, 2008).

Conflict should deescalate along with interventions, like the development and dialogue with KKBs towards a consensus that are currently being pursued. However, it must be remembered that the increasing number of conflicts and confrontations that are happening today in Papua are marked by an absence of “intermittent conflicts” and ceasefires, let alone agreements.

The security strategy that needs to be implement is not about deploying more personnel of the Indonesian Military (TNI) and National Police (Polri) to Papua, because it has been proven that this does not reduce linear conflicts. The solution is to increase the intelligence of these personnel, including their efforts to build a strategy for dialogue with KKBs and local communities.

Even though the embryo of the KKBs is the Free Papua Movement Organization (OPM), which was founded in 1965, they must be studied continuously and comprehensively, including their organizational ideology, number of members, networks, and their sources of funding.

The government's idea that there are "not many" KKB members is incorrect. The reality is that they are difficult to crush. Their movements and fighting strategies are developing very dynamically and progressively, including in terms of weapons and ammunition. These groups are assured of getting support from "outsiders".

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Efforts to create security and stability in Papua require intensive cooperation between the central and local governments. The role of local administrations is very important in evaluating regional security conditions and proposing appropriate strategies under a clause in Regulation in Lieu of Law (Perppu) No. 23/1959.

As for the local administrations that have tended to be passive in responding to conflict and violence in Papua, it is necessary to find a solution for their integration in order to create synergy in overcoming the security issues in Papua.

Nexus between conflict and development

The government’s implementation of the second iteration of the Special Autonomy Law (Otsus vol. 2), deemed as a soft power approach to address the security instability in Papua, has not been effective. The conventional government paradigm views security disturbances in Papua simply as a result of economic backwardness.

This is where building this nexus becomes important. Ironically, this nexus stops at only building connections without analyzing causality. Two different strategies are needed according to the concept of the conflict-development nexus, namely security and development, but carried out simultaneously and in an integrated manner.

Learning from the experience of Otsus vol. 1, the "cancellation" of the mandate to establish a Truth and Reconciliation Commission, the delay in the establishment of local parties, and the neglect of the expression of regional symbols will only weaken the conflict-development nexus strategy.

In fact, these three items are crucial for building trust between the central government and indigenous Papuans (OAPs) in the context of recognizing their human and political rights. It seems that the efforts to solve problems in Papua must start from zero, especially when viewed in the context of the security strategy that has been ineffective so far in dealing with separatist conflicts.

In this case, an effort to overcome security problems by relying only on special autonomy poses a great risk. There are three reasons for this. First, it is still difficult to predict when the Papuan people will enjoy the “fruits of development” of special autonomy, about which the government often reiterates that development will bring stability and security. Second, the legitimacy of special autonomy is very weak because it has been deemed to neglect the voice of the Papuan people. As a result, OAPs tend to be skeptical of the government’s development narrative.

Strong voices have been raised on rejecting the special autonomy, which has been accompanied by a discourse on the judicial review of the Special Autonomy Law that has been filed with the Constitutional Court. As regards implementation, the traumatic shadow of this “failure” still exists over the fate of Otsus vol. 1, including the aspects of disseminating information and monitoring.

Ignoring the conflict-development nexus will only weaken security and stability and disrupt the future development of Papua.

With minimal supervision, there was a massive leak in funding under Otsus vol. 1 that could potentially be misused for the benefit of “certain crooked officers”, including their efforts to create instability in Papua.

Meanwhile, the efforts to build transparency and accountability launched under Otsus vol. 2 could be hampered because many parties are yet to enjoy the benefits of special autonomy.

Third, as part of building its conflict-development nexus strategy, the government needs to calculate and anticipate the impacts of security on the implementation of special autonomy so as to clearly identify signs of the negative impacts of conflict on development. We need a critical approach to looking at the dynamics in Papua today.

The occurrence of various demonstrations rejecting the creation of new autonomous regions (DOB) as a result of the special autonomy mandate, which are a new type of conflict that threatens development, does not solely rise from ignoring the voice of OAPs or from the weak argument that expansion will improve welfare.

All are also related to the maneuvers of certain parties that fear being disadvantaged if special autonomy were implemented in a truly transparent manner.

Therefore, the conflict-development nexus in Papua needs to be strengthened with consistent policies that emphasize the aspects of humanitarian issues and justice. One of these is by widely enforcing the law on corruption that involves irregularities in the special autonomy fund, which now seem to have quieted. Ignoring the conflict-development nexus will only weaken security and stability and disrupt the future development of Papua.

Vidhyandika D. Perkasa, Senior Researcher at the Department of Politics and Social Changes, CSIS, Jakarta

This article was translated by Hyginus Hardoyo.