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Air Force apologizes after video of abuse against Papuan goes viral
Incident compared to US police brutality against George Floyd
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he Air Force scrambled on Wednesday to stem the fallout from a viral video showing the mistreatment of a deaf Papuan man by two of its members.
The video, which has been widely circulated on social media, has triggered another debate about systematic racism against native Papuans and has been compared to the footage of the United States police brutality against George Floyd, which sparked a wave of antiracism rallies around the globe last year.
“[The incident] happened solely because of the fault of our members, and there was no particular motive whatsoever, let alone an official order,” the Air Force chief of staff, Air Chief Marshal Fadjar Prasetyo, said in a video on Tuesday.
On Wednesday, the Executive Office of the President issued a rare statement condemning the incident, calling it “a form of excessive force and unlawful conduct”.
“The office is saddened, for an event like this casts the community in a negative light,” Presidential Chief of Staff Moeldoko said, adding that he encouraged all parties to engage in a dialogue to prevent such an incident from recurring in Papua.
‘Racism against Papuans’
The incident reportedly occurred in Merauke regency when the deaf Papuan man, who has yet to be identified, got into an argument with a street food vendor.
As the argument between them became more heated, two members of the Air Force military police—identified only as Second Sgt. D and Second Pvt. A—intervened, shouting at the man and forcibly leading him out of the food stall, onto the sidewalk and proceeding to pin him to the ground. One of the soldiers restrains the man's arm, while his partner stands with his boot on the man's head. The man does not appear to resist.
“This shows that racism against Papuans is ingrained in the minds of members of the state apparatus,” tweeted the Jakarta Legal Aid Institute (LBH Jakarta).
Some internet users said the video was reminiscent of the video of Floyd, who died after a US police officer forced him down and knelt on his neck. The incident sparked worldwide protests and inspired the hashtag #PapuanLivesMatter in Indonesia.
The Air Force clarified that the man had allegedly been intoxicated and was reportedly attempting to extort money from the food vendor and his customers, while the two Air Force members, who happened to pass by, only meant to break up the altercation.
The Air Force said that what its two members did as shown on the video was “excessive” and that they had been apprehended and were now being investigated in the Johannes Abraham Dimara Air Force base in Merauke.
The government has denied that there is systemic racism in Papua, saying that it has implemented a series of policies that benefit native Papuans.
Alleged censorship
The video was originally shared by Papuan journalist Victor Mambor through his Twitter account on Tuesday night, after receiving the footage from a colleague.
“After I posted the video, the response was massive. I received about 700 notifications of likes, comments and retweets within an hour,” Victor told The Jakarta Post on Wednesday.
Within three hours of posting, the video suddenly went missing, along with all of Victor’s previous tweets, as his account had been hacked and cleared out. “It’s always like this, I will post something, usually related to either the police or military, then I get hacked. This is a cybercrime, I can’t stand this anymore,” he said.
Victor managed to reclaim his Twitter account on Wednesday afternoon after reporting the case to Twitter with the help of internet freedom watchdog SafeNet.
The hacking attempt, however, did not prevent the spread of the footage.
A long list of offenses
Human rights activists welcomed the swift apology by the authorities but argued that apologies alone were not enough.
“We have to see through the investigation process, and this needs to be made transparent, the judicial process must be open. Don’t let this be covered up in a military court,” Amnesty International Indonesia spokesperson, Nurina Savitri said.
Veronica Koman, an outspoken advocate against the government’s handling of Papuan rights, concurred with Nurina, saying, “Papuans have never received justice in the general courts of Indonesia, the impunity of military personnel who always take refuge behind military courts must be ended.”
She said she planned to report the incident to the United Nation’s Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination (UN-CERD), believing that the case could serve as an entry point to other racial incidents against native Papuans.
Nurina said the use of excessive violence underlines the military’s lack of empathy toward the disabled community and is a clear violation of human rights, urging the government to rethink its deployment of the military as peacekeepers in Papua.
The government has failed to learn from its past mistakes, she added, as the incident is just another addition to the long list of military violence against Papuan civilians, with a majority of the victims never getting justice.
Amnesty International Indonesia noted that from February 2018 to July 2021, there were at least 54 alleged cases of extrajudicial killings in Papua and West Papua involving military and police personnel, claiming the lives of at least 90 people.
