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Restoring and Reviving Our Identity for Peace and Harmony in Melanesia, South Pacific and on Earth.
Our Origin, Our Clothing and Our Identity
We are the people of so-called “Koteka Tribes”, who have been living in stone-age era until late 1960s, who have come into modern world and currently preparing ourselves to enter into post postmodern era.
Koteka Tribes
There are seven major tribes in West Papua who are called the “koteka” tribes. These 7 Tribes will then be joined by tribes in Papua New Guinea, Vanuatu and other parts of Melanesia.
“Koteka” means those who wear penis gourd as their clothings for men.
Koteka Regions
Koteka Regions in West Papua consist of La-Pago and Mee-Pago cultural regions.
Refer to the map above, Koteka Region is the place where all humans originated from.
Koteka Tribal Assembly
Koteka Tribal Assembly was established on April 1999, under the direction of Sem Karoba, led by Timmy Nggurik, Menase Tabuni and other youths of the time.
They mobilized clan elders and held meetings and established Dewan Musyawarah Adat Koteka (henceforth DeMMAK), with headquarters at Sentani, Jayapura, West Papua.
Socio-Cultural Meaning of Koteka
“Koteka” has been used by tribes outside the Koteka peoples to refer to those tribes from central highlands synonimous to “backwards, naked, primitive, uncivilized, ” and other de-meaning connotations.
This demeaning use of the term has triggered those highlands tribes to form unified front to restore the meaning of “Koteka”.
Socio-Political “Koteka”
Socio-politically, “Koteka” has been seen as rebelling tribes, those who do not accept foreign influence, those who are fighting for the independence of West Papua.
Defending the rights and identity of the Koteka Tribes has been mis-interpreted by colonial government as fighting against its occupation on their regions.
Looking Forward for “Koteka”
Our dream and our struggle is to make “Koteka” peoples become the examples for the rest of Melanesia in the way organising ourselves in this modern, post modern and post postmodern era by (1) restoring or norms, values and systems, (2) codifying and legalizing our customary laws, (3) Legalizing our customary institutions as modern legal, socio-cultural and economic entities, (4) participate in modernisation processes.
Koteka Tribes as Transition Tribes
Transition Tribes means the modern tribes, the tribes are well-organised by themselves and legally recognised as Tribal People under modern nation-state’s positive law.
Characteristics of Transition Tribes
- Clear geographic map of customary land ares.
- Clear social map showing the map in loca languages and indicating families and clans who live in the territory.
- Own 1 Customary Organisation legal entity established and legally approved by modern nation-state.
- One 1 Business Entity established and legally approved by modern nation-state.
The Functions of Modern Customary Organisations
- Institutionalize and Legalize Customary NGO
- Institutionalize and Legalize Customary Business Entity to manage economic and business activities for members of the tribe and/ or within the customary area.
- Exclusive access to design insights.
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