Today, some teachers assigned to the remote areas are choosing to stay in Agats, the regency’s capital city.
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Kompas/P Raditya Mahendra Yasa
Children line up to wash their hands with soap before eating at SD YPPGI Agats elementary school, Agats district, Asmat regency, Papua, on Wednesday (24/1). The lack of knowledge about daily hygiene is still a problem for people in rural areas of Papua.
AGATS, KOMPAS — People living in the remote areas of Asmat regency in Papua tend to neglect their health for several reasons, including the absence of teachers that serve as role models. Today, some teachers assigned to the remote areas are choosing to stay in Agats, the regency’s capital city.
“Aside from missionaries, the people that play an important role in improving education in Papua’s remote areas, including Asmat, are teachers from Kei and Tanimbar. They teach hygiene to students,” Emerickus Sarkol, 67, an Asmat community leader, said on Thursday (25/1). Kei and Tanimbar are islands in the Maluku archipelago.
Sarkol recalled his experience during his school years. Before entering the classroom, all students were asked to form a line and the teacher checked their toesnails and fingernails. Those who had not bathed were told to do so and then come back to school.
Many of the teachers from Kei and Tanimbar are now retired. The results of their teaching have produced Asmat students who have become civil servants, soldiers of the Indonesian Military (TNI), police officers and even teachers. Many of them work professionally, but many others do not.
“Teachers who were role models have disappeared,” Sarkol said.
Kompas/P Raditya Mahendra Yasa
Children line up to wash their hands with soap before eating at SD YPPGI Agats elementary school, Agats district, Asmat regency, Papua, on Wednesday (24/1).
Many teachers who were born in Asmat did not enjoy kampung life, so have chosen to live in Agats. They said living in a kampung would take them far away from their families. Besides, no telecommunications network was available there. However, conditions in the kampung are now much better. Those appointed to the kampung do not care; their status as a civil servant makes them feel superior. They choose to pursue personal businesses rather than teach at school.
Kompas witnessed the situation in the kampungs of Pulau Tiga district. The Kapi and Aou kampungs have seen no educational activities for years. “The teachers are native people and they busy themselves with the timber business. We could not denounce them because we are uneducated fold,” said Daniel, a resident of Kapi.
As and Atat, two neighboring kampungs, share one school that has about 150 students. There is only one teacher, Ruslin, a non-permanent teacher from Bima, West Nusa Tenggara. Three other teachers native to Asmat never come to the school.
Health workers
When he met with Health Minister Nila Djuwita Anfasa Moeloek in Agats on Thursday, Papua Health Office head Aloysius Giyai said the malnutrition and infectious disease outbreak was because of the lack of health services. They needed health workers who actively reached out to the kampungs to teach about clean and healthy lifestyles.
Aloysius said that three years ago, a memorandum of understanding was signed between the Papua administration and the province’s city/regency administrations on the appoinment of health workers. The provincial administration launched a pilot program in 2015, the Floating and Barefoot Task Force.
Kompas/P Raditya Mahendra Yasa
Children line up to wash their hands with soap before eating at SD YPPGI Agats elementary school, Agats district, Asmat regency, Papua, on Wednesday (24/1).
The task force, which consisted of doctors, midwives, nurses, a nutritionist and environmental health experts, was tasked with delivering health services and campaigns to people living in the remote areas of Papua.
In 2016, the task force was deployed in Asmat regency. But no task force exists today.
Asmat Regent Elisa Kambu said Asmat comprised 23 districts and 224 kampungs. Traveling from Agats, the capital city, to the farthest district takes 30 minutes by plane or 8 hours by speedboat. This makes it difficult for the health workers to reach remote communities.
He acknowledged that the community health centers (puskesmas) had insufficient health workers, both in terms of quantity and quality. They also had a shortage of doctors.
Papua Legislative Council Commission V member Jhony Banua Rouw said developing Papua needed people with expertise who were ready to be deployed, but this would require a bigger budget allocation, given Papua’s geographical conditions. Jhony expressed hope that the central government would provide assistance through a transportation subsidy for reaching remote areas.
Ahmad Yulianto from the Health Ministry’s crisis center said a long-term program was needed to deal with the health issues in Asmat. The Health Ministry is now preparing a program for 10 Papuan regencies.
Meanwhile, the TNI Asmat Emergency Health Taskforce commander, Brig. Gen. Asep Setia Gunawan, said the integrated health team had visited 117 kampungs and examined 12,398 children. The team discovered 646 children with measles and 144 children suffering from malnutrition. Four children were suffering from measles and malnutrition and 25 others were suspected of having contracted measles. Seventy children had died by Jan. 24, 2018.
Currently, 8 measles patients, 23 malnutrition patients and 10 malaria patients are being treated at Agats Regional General Hospital. All require intensive care treatment. Meanwhile, 52 patients are recovering at the nearby Aula Protestant Church.
On Thursday, the TNI again deployed its Asmat Health Taskforce. The taskforce consists of 260 doctors and medical workers. They will be assigned to Papua and West Papua for nine months to provide complete health services.
TNI Commander Air Marshal Hadi Tjahjanto said during the deployment ceremony at Jakarta’s Halim Perdanakusuma Airbase that the military’s health taskforce for Papua was formed upon President Joko Widodo’s instruction at the TNI-Police Leadership Meeting on Jan. 23.
“The TNI has also readied three medical aircraft to support the taskforce’s operations,” Hadi said.
