Held at RMIT Capitol Theatre, Melbourne 24 October 2000
Louise Byrne
West Papuan visitor to Melbourne flying Morning Star flag from a gold Ferrari (Sunday Herald Sun, 19 October 2000).
It feels sacred in RMIT University's Capitol Theatre on Tuesday 24 October. The Morning Star flag of West Papua rises, and hangs suspended beneath the spectacular ceiling. Another flag, black, green, and red, with fourteen smaller white stars, also rises. It's less familiar, but also dear to the Papuans because it identifies them as Melanesian. From the stalls, the Victorian Trade Union choir murmurs Hai tanahku Papua (Papua is my homeland), a simple hymn tune carrying the words of a very controversial anthem. Bearing witness is a coalition of Australian public institutions—including religious organisations, four universities, trade unions, schools, nongovernment organisations, the Australia & Torres Strait Islander Commission, and supporters from Papua New Guinea, Vanuatu and Fiji. Also Dr Martin Luther Wanma, Director of the Gereja Kristen Alkitab Church in West Papua, and Jacob Rumbiak, an independence leader who has spent a quarter of his life in Indonesian jails, but who now lives in exile in Melbourne.
The flags are hoisted by Shaka and Zadrack Adadikam. Their father, Alfonsius, arrived in Melbourne in 1982 on the Granada, the first Indonesian ship to dock in Australia after the Maritime Union lifted its ban of protest against the United Nations Act of Free Choice in 1969 (by which Dutch New Guinea became Indonesian Irian Jaya). Alfonsius had been escorted from the engine room to meet an Australian-born woman from Sulawesi. She arranged for Alfonsius to marry her daughter, Natalie Lewier who, like many Indonesians in Melbourne, abhors the violence her countrymen perpetrate in West Papua. For the eighteen years Alfonsius has been in Melbourne, he has worked with the Uniting Church - which has a relationship with Gereja Kristen Injili, the biggest church in West Papua. Ironically enough, four days after the YUMI WANTAIM ceremonial, the GKI declared it was independent of its mother church in Indonesia.
YUMI WANTAIM begins at dusk in Swanston Street outside Capitol Theatre. Two gold, owner-driven, Ferraris, carrying Jacob and Pastor Wanma, fly past at high speed—challenging the usual perception of West Papuans as penis-gourded men with bows and arrows. Someone wondered why, or perhaps how Melbourne's business elite got involved in an independence ‘cause’. Dr Jon Kozeniauskas, a Collins Street dentist and owner of one of the Ferraris, said “If my Ferrari can do anything to help prevent in West Papua what we were forced to witness in East Timor, then I'll ring my friends and get ten more”.
Melbourne-based Fijians, and students from Vanuatu and Papua New Guinea were also keen to issue solidarity with West Papua. YUMI WANTAIM is Papua New Guinea pidgin for 'you and me, one time together'. The language is significant, for of all the Melanesians, perhaps it is Papuans who suffer most the shame of abandoning their kin in West Papua. Isabella Tree in her novel Islands in the Clouds (Lonely Planet Publications 1996) claims that West Papuans "silently observe (independent) Papua New Guinea like captives willing on the success of a runaway slave...while PNG has barely cast a glance in the direction of the border". The situation is complex. The PNG government is pressed by the Australian to respect Indonesia's claim over West Papua territory. At the same time, it is threatened and bribed by Indonesians to ignore its military's cruel and ugly meter. West Papuan refugees cluster on the east of the 141st meridian, where the resistance also has bush headquarters; chased by the Indonesians who have been known to destroy PNG villages suspected of harbouring exiles. Several border agreements have been reached, but invariably they've been ignored, or manipulated by one or both of the signatories.
The solid and cohesive Melanesian support for West Papua that was a feature of the South Pacific Forum in Kiribati three days after YUMI WANTAIM, was also in evidence at the Capitol three days earlier. Papua New Guinea, Fiji, and Vanuatu raised their colourful flags, and exchanged gifts with the West Papuans, while the Victorian Trade Union Choir sang the anthems, binding the small ceremonies with a rich and finely-tuned sonority. The Fijians' kava ritual issued solemn reverence, with representatives of Australia's aboriginal, secular and religious institutions sitting cross-legged on a woven mat to imbibe the sacred nectar. Fr Raass Asaeli, a Divine Word Missionary currently studying at Yarra Theological College, dressed in the beautifully woven drama of his ancestors and prepared participants for the silence of the transcendental moment. Dr Robert Wolfgramm from Monash University was draped in Academe's rich red robe while he sieved kava powder, fruit of the Mother, through waters belonging to a more austere being called Father Sky. Twelve recipients - community leaders, political analysts, a bishop, university lecturers, pastors, schoolteachers, students, and young mothers drank from the communion cup. It was a spectacular moment. Solidarity became sacred and secular, modern and traditional, christian and indigenous. Pregnant with soulful reason.
Mr Brian Butler from the Australia & Torres Strait Islander Commission, in "acknowledging and celebrating the strong and rich cultures of the indigenous people of the Asia Pacific region" broadened the region of concern for West Papua. He also localized the issue by reminding Australians that "the indigenous people of West Papua are fighting to protect their land, culture and identity ... the same fight that Australian Aboriginal and Torres Strait islander people have also fought for so many years".
He didn't mention another Australian relationship with West Papua, which began not in the Dreamtime, but during World War Two. The Royal Australian Navy and the Royal Australian Air Force, part of General MacArthur's taskforce to reclaim the Pacific from the Japanese, strafed and bombed the north coast of West Papua in 1944. The current Chief of Police in West Papua, SY Wenas, said recently that "thousands of unexploded WWII bombs still litter the seas and forests around Biak...fishermen who use them to bomb reefs trade them for Rp10-20,000 (aus$2-4) or sometimes just a packet of cigarettes or a can of beer" (Inside Indonesia, No 63, Jul-Sep 2000). Australia (and America and Japan) still owes West Papua for war operations of fifty-six years ago, but issues little concern for the one million neighbours who have maintained an inspirational non-violent struggle against brutal oppression for more than a decade.
Some Australians took some measures at YUMI WANTAIM to address the injustices. Mr Greg Sword, who is Vice-President of the Australian Council of Trade Unions (and President of the Australian Labor Party) signed an historic Memorandum of Understanding with West Papuan independence leader Jacob Rumbiak. The Memorandum calls for an internationally supervised United Nations-sponsored referendum in West Papua, and an urgent United Nations Human Rights Inquiry into the suffering and deaths caused by the Indonesian military. It proposes that Indonesia's claim over the independent territory of West Papua be reviewed by the United Nations. It also expresses concern that West Papuans are being excluded from benefits generated by the American-owned Freeport-McMoran gold and copper mine. Other signatories to the Memorandum were: Victorian Trades Hall Council; National Union of Workers; Construction, Forestry, Mining & Energy Union; Communications, Electrical, Electronic, Energy, Information, Postal, Plumbing and Allied Services Union of Australia; Australian Services Union; Australian Manufacturing Workers' Union; Australian Nursing Federation; Textile Clothing & Footwear Union of Australia; and the Australian Education Union.
During the evening, there were actual and symbolic references to the Melanesian nation of East Timor, for amongst Australians, the bloody wake of the freedom vote scarified some carefully nurtured scars. According to Alan Matheson, the International Officer of the Australian Council of Trade Unions "Australians are now recognizing that West Papuans are caught in the same cycle of violence that East Timorese were subjected to. Our politicians should act quickly to stay in line with public opinion on the treatment of our northern neighbours". Catholic Bishop Hilton Deakin, once vilified for his support of the East Timorese, but last year invited to Parliament House by the Prime Minister for his welcome-home-the-soldiers party, told Jacob and Pastor Wanma "We will stand with you, so that you can have your fundamental right of self determination". The Choir's moving rendition of "Solidarity' reminded many of the Mass in St Patrick's Cathedral that called attention to the stressful gestation of the newest nation on earth, and helped to force Prime Minister Howard to send Australian troops to East Timor.
Pastor Wanma's speech was characteristically simple. He'd been invited to Australia by the Uniting Church for a conference "Religion in Asia Pacific - Violence or Healing?", and said he was yearning and fighting for justice, even in 'new, democratic' Indonesia. He was surprised by the institutional support in Australia for his country, suggesting that "yumi wantaim is an old concept, but it's a new word for me, and I will take it home and tell my people it is a gift from Melbourne". He came to Australia to seek help "for young Papuans to study so we can develop our leadership. We need to find ways to transport the coconuts and the fish to the markets so that we can build our small economies. We want to create a healthy generation of Papuan women and children through well-managed primary healthcare programs".
As the unusual ritual for West Papua came to a close, people felt good. Many were relieved because a sizeable company of Australian voices was responding more to cries of help from West Papua than to Indonesian justifications for brutality. Melanesians from the South Pacific were happy because they'd actively supported their West Papua kin. Unionists were happy because they'd signed a program that was in accord with their principles. The West Papuans were happy, because they'd found friends in Australia. In fact, one might be tempted - if human rights and self-determination were a commercial business - to hail it as a winwin kindava nait.
Louise Byrne, Melbourne 2001
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