During my years in Timika I became particularly close to the locals principally the Amungme tribe. I was there during the riots of 1996, tribal wars in 1996/1997/1998, Military actions in 1996/1997/1998. There are several things that I would like to offer for thought.

In 1996 a large scale uprising resulted in the closure of mining operations for about a week. My wife and I were at the hospital in Tembagapura when the uprising started and were eye witnesses to most of the events. The events in 1996 became a turning point for some of the problems today. In 1996 there was not an overly large military presence in the Timika/Tembagapura area. As the riots unfolded PTFI Jakarta requested and received a large military reaction resulting in the airlifting of some 2000 troops to the area. After securing the area (from a military/security perspective) they remained on-site to free the hostages (Dutch/English/Indonesian) that had been held for some 4 months. Negotiations with the "locals" also took place and this is the time frame that PTFI promised 1% profits to the "locals", reassigned several managers that were identified by the "locals" as causing major problems (I still have a copy of the original letter sent to PTFI during the riots). It was also during this time that a major mistake was made (in my view and now probably in PTFI's view also). PTFI decided that the best way to avoid another problem like this was to radically increase the military presence permanently. PTFI established a new department called Emergency Preparedness Office headed by Tom Green. This office was given a huge budget and the task to get the military setup and support them. Approximately $34M was spent on infrastructure to support the increased presence. Included were facilities for the DANDIM (Army), KODIM (Army), POLRES (Police), DANLANAL(Navy), PASKHAS (Air Force), and various facilities in Tembagapura. Included was a monthly budget to support transportation, meals, and other expenses. In western terms the money flood gate was opened and the Military took full advantage of it.

As this was happening another problem was occurring, the opening of Kuala Kencana. A city very much like a suburban city in USA was opened to support the Administrative side of PTFI. This city located some 25km from Timika was complete in every respect from electricity (24 hours while Timika was still on 12 hour power only), water (Timika water very bad), TV, sewer, nice roads, shopping (restricted to PTFI employees only), transportation, extremely nice houses (compared to Indonesian standards), air conditioning, etc, etc, etc. This exclusive city created a very wide dividing line between locals (and other Indonesians) and the PTFI employees who qualified for the special status it took to live in KK. It does not take a college degree to see the social problems that this city created. As the provincial government increased pressure to employ local residents more and more people were working in KK and living in Timika. So each day they were presented with a glaring example of what life should be like in all its splendor and returning home each night to Timika or Kwamki Lama where conditions range from poor to bad. Before KK these conditions were accepted as life in the jungle given its remoteness. After KK the example of good life in the jungle became very apparent and made the conditions in Timika clearly inadequate. This social problem will become more and more of a lightning rod over time and if steps are not taken to improve infrastructure in the surrounding area, PTFI will receive the blame. There are many examples of how PTFI could have worked to prevent or at least alleviate the social problems but chose instead to ignore or evade any responsibility.

The city of Timika itself came into existence because of PTFI and currently, to put it bluntly, exists to feed off the crumbs of PTFI. Prices in Timika are extremely high, unemployment is extremely high, and recreation essentially does not exist.

If you combine the situations described above and analyze the current situation and add the long standing frustration of the locals you can begin to see what is going on.

The current situation is explosive. Described by some Amungme friends as gasoline on the ground needing only a match to set it off.

• Currently 6000 military of various branches. Young men very bored, far from families carrying guns. Many instances of military versus military conflicts were witnessed by myself. Remember the basic pay of the military is virtually nothing. No recreation other than bars, discos and nightclubs are available but the prices are out of reach to most. Most of the off duty military carry guns. Most every week an instance occurs of drunk military shooting in a bar (even in the exclusive Kuala Kencana Disco).

  The cost of living in Timika is unrealistically high.

• PTFI management is blind to the problem and those who speak out are sent home. It is not the individuals, who for the most part are good upstanding people that would like to do the right thing, it is the collective management system that is unresponsive or cannot accept the necessary dynamics to deal with the problem.
• The locals now are more organized and have not forgotten the instances of cheating, dishonesty, and outright illegal acts committed years ago. Land acquisitions, promises of employment, broken promises, and others by PTFI and the local governments all are remembered by the locals. They truly have been wronged but to say it is one person's fault is fundamentally wrong. It is the fault of the situation and the blindness of PTFI to social responsibility that has caused the problem. For a company who has been in Indonesia for some 30 years it is unbelievable that they can be so blind to the basic Indonesian culture.

To summarize; the locals (Irianese, now calling themselves Papuans) have been wronged repeatedly. Specific instances are resultant from the blindness of PTFI management to the root cause of the problems. I have had many, many discussions with the locals and found that the basic desire is to be treated as humans and not animals. The local senior management of PTFI is essentially comprised of accountants who cannot or will not listen to the locals nor Indonesians. If the situation does not change you can bet there will be many many instances in the news over the next few months and years. It will not stop and will become a major issue soon.