Workers employed by mining multinational Freeport McMoran in the Indonesian
province of West Papua struck from 18 to 21 April, gaining a 100 percent wage
increase among other concessions. 6,000 workers at Grasberg, the world’s second
largest copper and gold mine, slowed production – resulting in estimated losses
of $11.32 million for the New Orleans based company.
As Frans Pigome of Tongoi Papua, the main group involved in organising the
strike told the Times on 22 April, “We are satisfied. After more than 40 years
in operation, this is the most spectacular increase,” adding that, “They could
have increased it years ago, but they think only how to profit themselves.”
Freeport worked closely with the dictatorial Suharto regime during the
1970s and 80s, becoming Indonesia’s biggest tax-payer. As Benny Wemba of the
Free West Papua Movement puts it, “Just in one year, 2006, Freeport paid US $1.6
billion in taxes to the Indonesian government. How do you think Indonesia can
afford to have the biggest military in SE Asia?”
According to Wemba, Freeport has funded para-military forces to police its
mine, including $20 million between 1998 and 2004. To West Papuans, Freeport
perpetuates the occupation of their land, “the Indonesian military (TNI) has
murdered over 100,000 Papuan men, women and children and tortured and raped
countless others” says Wemba, “Freeport McMoran and Rio Tinto directly fund the
TNI. Anyone who helps my enemy is my enemy too.”
The settlement will result in an increase in the wages of the lowest paid
workers at the mine to $341 per month. However, Tongoi Papua had initially
tabled demands for larger wage increases, better pensions, improved worker
representation and programs to increase the proportion of Papuans in the
workforce of the mine.
Out of the 9,000 employees at Grasberg, only 3,000 are Papuan, giving rise
to charges of discrimination and the marginalisation of local people. Freeport
officials have only said that they will begin a feasability study concerning a
“Papuan affairs department” within the company although they did agree to
arrange for the removal of some Jakarta-based Indonesian officials.
Moreover, instead of the 3.2 million rupiah offered to Grasberg workers,
Tongoi Papua had initially pushed for 3.6 million. Pigome also threatened to
shut down the mine for one month or more if their demands were not met, although
in the face of military and police intimidation this longer stoppage did not
materialize.
While about 6,000 mine workers struck at Grasberg itself, Tongoi Papua also
organised protests in the regional capital, Timika, beginning on 17 April.
Hundreds gathered to coincide with collective wage negotiations being carried
out between local politicians and Freeport representatives, where they were met
by dozens of armoured vehicles, 200 police and soldiers armed with riot gear and
firearms.
As Penina Karma, secretary of Tongoi Papua told Reuters on 17 April, “This
is a surprise to us. It is just like a war.”
Despite the intense military and police presence, workers elected to strike
when their calls for talks with Freeport executives were rejected by the
company. Although no violence was reported against those taking part, an
internal Freeport memorandum was leaked to Reuters on 19 April in which company
executives described the strike as illegal and that workers who left their jobs
to participate in the illegal strike, “could be subject to disciplinary
measures,” an indication of how seriously Freeport has taken events around the
Grasberg mine.
The Grasberg strike comes after a wave of similar actions at mines across
the world. Zambian workers struck in March to secure a 20 percent wage increase
while the world’s largest copper mine at Escondida in Chile was shut down for
almost a month last year. Inco workers in Canada shut also down a nickel mine in
March, while indigenous protesters in New Caledonia have frustrated the Goro
nickel project since its inception, driving up costs and putting the future of
the mine in doubt.
According to Catherine Courmans of the NGO Miningwatch, “We are seeing
increasingly strong actions by increasingly vigilant communities around the
world that are determined to protect their human and environmental
rights.”
Mining corporations are scrambling to deal with an epidemic of resistance.
As Courmans puts it, “These once isolated communities are better linked globally
and are better informed about the potential long term impacts of mining.”
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