Paparisa Ambon Bergerak: Scraping Conflict Partition, Building Digital Economy in Maluku

Hundreds of university students were sitting together at the Auditorium of the Pattimura University. They were learning about media literacy, especially digital media, to help them tackling hoax and using the internet in healthy ways. As quoted from Serambimaluku.com, the event was initiated by Tempo Institute, Siberkreasi (Cyber creation team) of the Ministry of the Communication and Informatics along with local community network namely Paparisa Ambon Bergerak or Paparisa Ambon Moves.

Paparisa Ambon Bergerak often collects young people from doing positive activities. The community is officially set up in 2015 to unite groups of young people after the riot. Paparisa frequently utilizes digital technology to spread information and invite them to join in it.

“Because we are young people who actively use social media, so we make use of digital technology from the first to reach other young friends,” said Pierre Adelaar Ajawaila, the initiator of Paparisa Ambon Bergerak, when was encountered at the end of May 2018.



Digital media, according to Pierre, is a powerful bridge to connect inter-island in Maluku province. Digital media is more capable of reaching people when land, sea and air transportation isn’t yet fully developed. From this point, they meet and collaborate to create joint works.

Unfortunately, digital media usage for economic development is still limited, according to Pierre. The use of digital technology is only for selling creative products on social media or uploading creative contents. He said that digital technology could actually be used to give benefits, such as driving new markets, making it easier for quicker payment method and promoting tourism destinations in the beautiful Maluku.

“The cause is because telecommunication network isn’t good thus Maluku’s potential isn’t yet exposed. That is why digital infrastructure development is required to drive the growth of the digital economy,” said Pierre who is also an architect.

In addition to telecommunication infrastructure necessity, Pierre said another obstacle was on the capacity of the human resources. The digital economy really requires public creativity and strategy to yield products that can compete with those from other regions. While in Maluku, Pierre said, there were still a lot of people who were thinking in short-term.

That is why Pierre hopes digital infrastructure is massively built in Maluku as he and his friends keep attempting to improve the abilities of the young people in the region hence their works can penetrate the digital market. Paparisa plans to initiate a startup or a platform to distribute products from Maluku.

Their hope is welcomed. The government through the Ministry of Communication and Informatics is targeting internet network in the Province of Maluku to be completed by 2019. As quoted from Antaranews.com, the Minister of Communication and Informatics Rudiantara said the Ring Palapa project or known as optical fiber cable had reached Papua Province and would connect Maluku. The project is able to disburse internet service with the speed of 10 Mbps to rural areas and 20 Mbps to urban sites.

“I can ensure you that when the Palapa ring is fulfilled, there won’t be any tariff or network discrepancies between Indonesia East and West,” said Rudiantara.

The Palapa Ring is one of the solutions overcoming inter-regions gap and encouraging new economy with the help of digital facilities. Utilizing digital economy to help driving regional development is one of the sub-themes for the Indonesia Development Forum 2018. The forum which is initiated by the National Development and Planning Agency or Bappenas and the Australian Government through Knowledge Sector Initiative carries a big theme called “Pathways to Tackle Regional Disparities across the Archipelago”.

The peak of the IDF 2018 will be held 10-11 July 2018 in Jakarta. IDF 2018 drives accelerated development in Indonesia to be more equal and more sustainable based on knowledge, experience and fact. The result of the event will be used as materials to formulate National Medium Term Development Plan 2020-2024.

Creativity Nourishes Peace

The idea of Paparisa establishment emerges after riots erupting in Ambon between 1999 and 2005. Young people in Ambon at that time are divided based on religion. In 2009, Pierre Adelaar Ajawaila and his friends gather to make street activities called Ambon Bergerak or Ambon Moves. They have used a donated house called Paparisa as a place for gathering since 2014. Paparisa Ambon Bergerak is set up in 2015.

Paparisa opts becoming an inclusive community that doesn’t put any certain requirements for those who want to join in it and make a network. The reason is, according to Pierre, any kind of creative activities will erase all religious-related partitions in Ambon. Paparisa which means “home” is opened for any groups that open dialogue rooms and love peace.

“Anyone who wishes to come will be welcomed well. If they want to cooperate with us, we are pleased to work with them, they don’t need to be members that are tied in specific regulations. Free and open for anyone to come anytime and they can leave anytime,” said Pierre.

Paparisa Ambon Bergerak is indeed full of activities. Some of them are the public speaking class, history class on the history of Ambon, entrepreneurship class, music class and many others. These are the points where Paparisa wants to make all young elements of the city of Ambon are accustomed to meet, sit together so as riots in the past won’t occur again.**