Expansion: Blessing or Curse?

I waited and waited for the so famous sunset in Kaimana as promoted by a popular old song “Senja di Kaimana”. But the beautiful sunset never happened. Well yeah the sun still set but it didn’t look as spectacular as I had expected. Perhaps it’s because of the weather. It’s very cloudy when I was there early July. They say you should come in October to Kaimana to witness that supposedly beautiful sunset. So yeah … bad timing.

Like Bintuni, Kaimana just recently became a new regency. Both regions were used to be the districts of Fakfak. Ever since the new special autonomy for Papua was launched, there have been many new regencies, districts, or even villages. They will set up 3 new provinces in this island after the 2009 national election.

However, considering the small number of population compared to the size of the island, often the new regencies or districts are underpopulated or are just enough to meet the number of population requirement. There are only about 3 million people in the whole island (Indonesian part). I heard sometimes they manipulate the amount to meet the minimum requirement. I saw a new village with only 14 houses (but probably around 20 families lived there).

It seems that people in this region have been pouring so much energy to this particular matter. It’s a hot issue. Sometimes they seem to be overdoing this. There is a reason to that. This expansion (“pemekaran”) needs a lot of money. Using the special autonomy as a vehicle, the central government throws so much money for Papua. Is it to wash the central government’s sins of having ignored Papua in the past? Or is it to prevent the Papuans from demanding their independence.

This expansion brings some positive impact to the regions. Physical development is the most obvious one. New streets, new public facilities or even new jobs are created. The education in Bintuni is free. Over the past years, many people from other East Indonesia come to the newly set regency or districts to look for jobs or business opportunities.

However, it also creates lots of opportunities for corruption. And, problems in other areas still remain. Has the expansion managed to eradicate poverty? Has it enabled the Papuan to handle malnutrition problem? Has it improved the quality of human resources? One may argue that it takes some time to see the impact on those above mentioned area. It’s a long process. Meanwhile, let the government officials or members of parliament get as much money as they want.