Poachers slaughter animals at border

PAPUA New Guinea’s protected animals and marine life are been slaughtered daily for the lucrative Asian markets along the unmonitored PNG-Indonesian border in Western, the Border Development Authority says.
In a statement, the agency said these illegal activities were happening because of the absence of government services and officers at the Weam border post and Bula village in the South Fly District.
Weam, situated inland, and Bula, on the coast, are the last PNG villages before Indonesian territory.
Boarder authority officers saw illegal trading between Bula villagers and Indonesian poachers when delivering materials for social infrastructural projects at Bula village and Morehead station last week.
Indonesian poachers are teaming up with PNG villagers to hunt deer, sharks, river fish such as saratoga, barramundi and even poisonous Papuan taipans.
Deer meat is sold at 12,900 rupiahs (about K3) per kilogram in Indonesia and the poachers do not leave until the coolers on their dinghies are filled up with 750kg worth of meat.
Saratogas are sold for 15,000 rupiahs (about K4) per kg and barramundi’s air sack is sold for 1.2 million rupiahs (about K300). Both species are sold to be processed for medicine in Indonesia.
The statement said the Papuan taipan was sold for 43 million rupiahs (about K10,000) for their poison to be used for medicine.
Bula villager Mark Pize said poachers had taught them a new technique of killing deer with knives.
“Before we used bows and arrows to kill deer for consumption and large herds can still be seen wondering near our village. But now the meat is killed for Indonesian markets and herds are killed on a large scale,” he said.
“The technique is to whistle to confuse the herds and they just stand. You can just walk over and kill all of them with a knife. They will not run away even if they see one deer being killed.”
He admitted that deer herds that usually were found near their village had diminished and the villagers now had to travel much further to hunt for them.
Pize said they now regarded themselves as Indonesians because Waigani and Daru had ignored them and they resorted  to such practices for their survival.
“It is illegal but we poach to survive. Children are growing up without knowing PNG’s official currency kina and toea but are familiar with Indonesian rupiah currency. PNG kina had no value here,” he said.
They are growing up knowing that Bahasa (Indonesian official language) and not that English, pidgin, motu are the common PNG languages.
“We don’t have schools here and most of our children are going across to live with our Indonesian friends to attend schools in Merauke.
“We don’t have business activities like agriculture and fishing projects to generate income.
“We are used to eating Indonesian products for basic household goods like rice, sugar, salt, flour received from the poachers in exchange for our wild life.”
Another border villager, Augustine Pikanes, from Wando village, said they need PNG security forces to be stationed at Weam as Indonesian security forces sometimes mistreated them. “We need security forces so that as we can be treated fairly.”
A concerned Indonesian poacher, Wilem Balagaze said he was sorry for the PNG villagers as the PNG Government could not develop their own people.
“We, Indonesians, are more than willing to come and develop the economy and construct infrastructural projects for roads, health and education services for these villagers,” he said.
“We want to work with the PNG Government to develop these areas. But if the PNG Government neglects their people, we are ready now.
“It’s easy to bring things form Merauke then from Daru and Port Moresby. After all, it’s only two hours by dinghy to Merauke and one day to Daru.”