Fight to Save Orangutans Intensifies

By Dave Currey

In the Spring 2000 AWI Quarterly (Vol. 40, No. 2), we published a graphic account of the perils encountered by the Environmental Investigation Agency (EIA) team in the Borneo area of Indonesia. You may want to reread Dave Currey’s harrowing description of beatings, kidnap attempts and a hairbreadth escape from thugs organized to prevent EIA’s efforts to save the orangutans and their forest home. This can also be viewed by clicking here "Kidnap and Violence Echoes the Plight of Orangutans."

• As precious resources are running out, these protected wild areas are becoming more valuable because unprotected areas have already been demolished. Forests provide valuable timber and, below the surface, valuable minerals and coal, diamonds, bauxite and iron ore, so the land becomes targeted by large mining or forestry companies, and other political pressures kick in. In Indonesia, where the EIA and its campaign partner, Telapak Indonesia, have been fighting to save Tanjung Puting National Park, they call this “money politics.” We call it corruption. 

• We’ve persuaded the World Bank and IMF and other donors to Indonesia to raise the illegal logging of Tanjung Puting at every opportunity, and they’ve taken it on as a test case for the Government of Indonesia to prove it will deal with forestry corruption. We’ve been dealing with the new democratically elected Government. But the logging is worse now than when we started.

• We’ve heard that Abdul Rasyid, the timber baron that we’ve named repeatedly in reports, on TV and at press conferences, is under intense pressure and has started to bribe people in very high places. An Army General has just threatened the official who is investigating Rasyid.

• We’re assured that the government is investigating Rasyid and will stop illegal logging. We apply some pressure, set deadlines, and give the Minister the latest information from the Park. Our network of contacts keeps us updated with information on a daily basis. We have no doubt that we have support from the international community and some parts of government, but that’s not enough.

• Under the lens of Japanese NHK television, the British Ambassador had breakfast with us and said he had discussed Tanjung Puting with the President. We were invited to have lunch with the President at the palace before our next press conference. This, of course, was great news because it meant that our work was reaching the top.

• A crew from CBS’s “60 Minutes” filmed our activities and focused on the violence carried out by Rasyid’s company thugs. They told us what they had heard and asked us what security arrangements we had in place. Jakarta was packed with rumors of street riots and serious civil unrest. “You’ve caused Rasyid some serious problems—don’t forget that,” they warned.

• At lunch the President listened intently, expressed genuine concern and showed he knew about Tanjung Puting by naming Abdul Rasyid as the timber baron responsible for looting the Park. He even set up a press conference in the Palace and asked the Minister to tell the press what we had discussed. He endorsed our campaign with his remarks but said he couldn’t attend the press conference because there were too many difficult questions the press wanted to ask about other issues!

• Abdul Rasyid has had his boats carrying illegal timber seized. The government has promised it will act. But the only way to judge the success of a campaign is whether illegal logging in the Park has stopped, the orangutans are once again protected and the timber baron is behind bars. None of these goals has yet been achieved.

• EIA and Telapak followed the Indonesian government to their annual donor review meeting held in Tokyo. Guided to our seats by the Head of the World Bank in Indonesia, we were able to get our strongest possible message to the seven Indonesian Cabinet Ministers in the room. “We are not giving up—live up to your promises and save Tanjung Puting National Park. Now!”

Photo:  Ronnie, an adult female in her thirties, lives free in the forests of Tanjung Putting National Park in Central Kalimantan, Borneo. She has just given birth to her third offspring. Even in this “protected” area, illegal loggers are cutting down the orangutan’s food trees. Just three months ago, over 1000 of the trees in Tanjung Puting were illegally logged. (Sharon Gekoski-Kimmel/Orangutan Foundation International)