Citizen Media and Civil Resistance in West Papua
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3. Citizen media and civil
resistance in West Papua
Abstract: This article charts the dynamics and trajectory of citizen media
activism in West Papua's fight for freedom which has progressed from not
even registering in news rooms around the world to influencing sub-regional
and regional bodies. Citizen media has played an essential role in this trans-
formation. In 1998, when the Indonesian military massacred more than 100
unarmed West Papuans in Biak Island, it took weeks and months to get the
news out. Back then West Papua was a military operations area (Daerah
Operasi Militer). Few journalists were willing to risk travelling into the
country to get the story out. In January 2016 West Papua remains an occu-
pied colony. The Indonesian government still tries to curtail open access to
West Papua for foreign journalists but courageous young people armed with
cell phones are finding ways to bypass the government's failed attempt at an
informational blockade and it is making a difference. West Papuans are now
members of the Melanesian Spearhead Group and the Pacific Island Forum
is starting to take notice of the Pacific's longest running self-determination
and decolonisation struggle.
Keywords: citizen media, conflict reporting, human rights, Indonesia,
Melanesia, peace journalism, political journalism, West Papua
JASON MACLEOD
University of Queensland
N JULY 1998, Papuans gathered around the water tower in Biak City. For
four days they sang hymns, prayed, danced, hoisted the Morning Star flag
and demanded freedom. Protest leader Filep Karma stressed that he was en-
gaged in a bold experiment (Karma, 2014; see also Karma, 2013):
I said that Papuans must fight peacefully.... I then told the people that
my objective in raising the Morning Star flag at the Biak water tower was
to tell the world that the Papuan nation desires to be free. [Before when
Papuans raised] the flag in the jungle it was ineffective. Soldiers don't
reach that area. No one sees it. But if you [raise the flag] in the town a lot
of people can see it including the media and automatically the story gets
disseminated globally. When I raised the Morning Star flag in Biak no
one had ever done it. No one had kept the flag flying for 24 hours. When
I did it in Biak I told my brothers and sisters who helped me, to keep it
38 PACIFIC JOURNALISM REVIEW 22 (1) 2016View entire presentation