Jayapura, Jubi – Papua Legislative Council urged the Central Government enforcing PT Freeport Indonesia to build a smelter in Papua, said a Papuan Councilor, Willem Wandik.
He said for whatever the reason is, the smelter could not be built at the outside of Papua. According to him, it’s a time for the industrial company and regional financial management to be returned to the local government.
“We shouldn’t be the second. Papua has equal right in this country. The Central Government always treated it unfairly. So, now we demanded a smelter to be built in Papua,” Willem Wandik said by phone on Sunday (25/1).
Few times ago, the Papua Governor Lukas Enembe with the Chairman of Papua Legislative Council, Yunus Wonda and the Chairman of Papua People’s Assembly, Timotius Murib held a meeting with the Papuan local and national parliament members. They agreed not support the development of smelter at outside of Papua.
“If the smelter was built outside of Papua, we will blockade the Freeport mining activities. We want the attention, not to be the second,” he said.
Last week, the Papua Governor Lukas Enembes said the government officials and Papuan community leaders rejected a smelter development plan at Gresik, East Java. He said the natural resources of Papua must be processed in Papua instead of in other regions.
“For decades, the people of Papua are living in poverty because the mining of PT Freeport Indonesia has been processed abroad. Now PT Freeport will build a smelter at Gresik, East Java. Therefore we rejected it,” Enembe told reporters at on Friday in Jakarta (23/01).
According to him, a smelter would be cost about seven trillion rupiahs while Papuans only get the revenue sharing fund of three hundred billion rupiahs. “Foreign investors in Indonesia, in particular in Papua, should consider the aspects of justice, welfare and prosperity of local community. We represented the people of Papua asking PT. Freeport to endorse the justice and welfare of the people of Papua,” he said. (Arjuna Pademme/Rom)
