West Papuan Students in Crisis

PLEASE NOTE THESE STUDENTS ARE NOT POLITICAL ACTIVISTS, RATHER INNOCENT STUDENTS TRYING TO ACHIEVE THEIR EDUCATION GOALS AND IMPROVE LIVES BACK HOME FOR THEIR PEOPLE. THEY POTENTIALLY RISK THEIR SAFETY JUST SPEAKING UP ABOUT THEIR SITUATION.

(MOHON DIPERHATIKAN MAHASISWA INI BUKAN AKTIVIS POLITIK, MEREKA INI CUMAN MAHASISWA YANG TIDAK BERSALAH DAN POLOS DAN YANG SEDANG BERUSAHA MENCAPAI TUJUAN PENDIDIKAN DI AUSTRALIA DAN UNTUK MENINGKATKAN KEHIDUPAN DI PAPUA. MEREKA MENGAMBIL RESIKO UNTUK KESELAMATAN MEREKA CUMAN KARENA BERBICARA TENTANG SITUASI MEREKA LEWAT BERITA).

"My hopes for my future and my education have been taken away" says Efika Kora who is her final year of a long emotional journey (travelling from Timika in remote West Papua to Adelaide, Australia) to become a fully qualified commercial pilot, when she found out her government scholarship was abruptly cancelled, through no fault of her own. 

Efika is one of a group of 5 West Papuan students in South Australia and a larger group of students around the world in this devastating situation. 

The Australia West Papua Association – SA (www.awpaadelaide.com) is an incorporated non-government organisation that gives support and advocacy for West Papuan people, both in West Papua and Australia. We heard of the predicament of these Papuan students studying in Adelaide, and discussed with them how we and other concerned people might be of help.

There is a big problem in a remote province in Indonesia called West Papua (also known as Papua Barat and formerly Irian Jaya Barat -West Irian) and the local indigenous population are very disadvantaged. There is widescale political unrest and poverty in this region and to try help the situation a group of indigenous students have been granted scholarships to study internationally.

Earlier this year, over 160 of these special scholarships were cancelled for unclear political reasons and through no fault of the individual students. Now the young students are now being forced to abandon their dreams of tertiary education and return home to West Papua. Many of these come from poor backgrounds and without the scholarships they cannot continue. A small group of these West Papuan students reached out to the Australian West Papua Association- SA for help with their situation are pictured below.

What can we do? With your help, we are going to help a group of 5 West Papuan students realise their dreams and safety finish their university studies here in Australia after their scholarships were stopped. This acheivement is inspirational to the people of West Papua, sends a message that the rest of the world cares about the region of West Papua and allows the students the chance to safely finish and return with full qualifications to be community leaders in their chosen profession.

We are aiming to raise $30,000 - which is $6,000 for each student to help cover living expenses for the next year so they can safely concentrate on finishing their studies. We aim to provide $100-150 per week for food and transport per student. Generous locals (connected to AWPA-SA) have amazingly gifted the West Papuans students safe suitable accommodation and the students are committed to working part time jobs *as you can see from pictures of them currently fruit picking to try and earn their own money, but the cost of living in Australia is very high and we also want them to be able to focus on their studies after their recent stress about the loss of their scholarships.

As we raise this money, AWPA-SA will keep sharing more stories about the 5 individual students your donations are assisting. If we get more than our $30K target (YES, please - that would be great!!) we can reach out with offers of support to other West Papuan students in the same tragic situation across Australia and other parts of the world

The first individual student story we share is - West Papuan future pilot Efika Kora- please check out her video and donate as much as you can to help her stay as she is only 2 semesters away from achieving her educational and professional dream. 

4 more student videos will be shared on rotation over the duration of our campaign.