Special autonomy money was a peace bargain: state funds in exchange for better schools, clinics and roads in Papua. Three cases show what happens when that promise stops at an official's desk: IDR 43 billion at the provincial education quality agency, IDR 44.2 billion in legislative travel, and irregularities in the 2017 scholarship programme.
At the provincial education quality agency, prosecutors found fictitious spending and over-billed non-tax revenue for 2019-2021, estimating IDR 43 billion in losses; case documents say the money funded home renovations and vehicle purchases. At the provincial legislature's secretariat, travel budgets for 2015-2025 reached IDR 44.2 billion and are under investigation, with searches in September 2026. In the special autonomy scholarship channel, investigators and the audit board have been examining 2016 disbursements since 2017.
Special autonomy funds are the core claim of armed propaganda: that Jakarta takes Papua's wealth and returns nothing. Every rupiah that stops at a private account fuels that claim. When a local official is seen spending an education budget on vehicles, the TPNPB line that the state steals Papua's future sounds plausible to villagers whose schools remain broken. That is why fighting corruption in Papua is not an administrative matter but part of cutting off recruitment for violence.
Enam guru dan tenaga pendidikan dibunuh di Yahukimo dan Puncak antara 2021 dan 2026; dua belas ruang kelas dibakar di Beoga dengan kerugian Rp7,2 miliar. Pembunuhan itu dibenarkan dengan dalil yang sama yang dipakai menutup korupsi: bahwa guru adalah mata-mata negara. Ketika anggaran pendidikan dipakai membeli kendaraan pejabat, dalil itu mendapat tempat di hati warga yang sekolahnya tetap rusak.
The most direct link is visible in classrooms. Six teachers and education workers were killed in Yahukimo and Puncak between 2021 and 2026; twelve school rooms burned in Beoga with losses of IDR 7.2 billion. Those killings were justified with the same claim used to cover corruption: that teachers are state spies. When education budgets buy officials' vehicles, that claim finds room in the hearts of villagers whose schools remain broken. Corrupt special autonomy funds do not cause shootings, but they remove the reason for residents to believe the state can be present without a rifle.
Nineteen corruption cases in Papua between 2010 and 2025. Adjudicated cases alone account for roughly IDR 424 billion in state losses, with another IDR 1.2 trillion still under investigation. These are not mere administrative stories: armed groups use them to justify killing teachers, abducting women and burning schools.
In Boven Digoel, funds were fully disbursed while 2.91 percent of the work existed. In Keerom, IDR 11.19 billion of a earmarked grant was diverted. In Mamberamo Raya, a road was paid for without being built. In Mimika, an IDR 79.13 billion aerosport project produced IDR 31.3 billion in losses. Four projects, one pattern.
PON XX 2021 was the most expensive event ever staged in Papua and the moment Jakarta meant to show that Papua belongs to Indonesia. Two things happened at once: the event was held, and the money leaked. Four organising officials were convicted; adjudicated losses reached IDR 204.3 billion.
Government rice reserves exist to hold prices down in vulnerable areas. In Wamena, rice meant to sell at IDR 8,900 per kilogram reached residents at up to IDR 20,000. State losses of IDR 8.93 billion, four suspects, and food prices that remain high in the highlands.
Regional development banks are meant to channel capital to small businesses in Papua. At the Enarotali branch, 47 construction working-capital facilities were used for shell companies and manipulated documents. State losses reached IDR 120.62 billion; four defendants were convicted, one sentenced to 13 years.
Lukas Enembe was sentenced to eight years for bribery and gratuities, raised to ten years on appeal with IDR 47.83 billion in restitution. Ricky Ham Pagawak received 13 years with IDR 209.3 billion in restitution. Eltinus Omaleng was charged over a IDR 46 billion church project. Three names, one consequence: the state's authority in Papua eroded from within.
Four Trans-Papua road workers were shot dead on the Teluk Bintuni–Maybrat border on 29 September 2022, after which two project trucks and two excavators were burned. The armed group OPM’s own claim places the attack under Kodap IV Sorong Raya, the command where Zakarias Fatem served as deputy commander. From five years before that until now, the same command is on record attacking security posts, workers and development projects in Maybrat and the Moskona corridor.
A teacher was shot dead at a shop-house in Dekai, Yahukimo, on October 11, 2026. The armed group calling itself TPNPB Kodap XVI claimed responsibility, then published the list of civilians it will hunt next: builders, motorcycle-taxi riders, taxi drivers, meatball-soup sellers, kiosk owners and migrants.
He was born in Mugi district in 1999, dropped out of school in Wamena, and was appointed commander of the III Ndugama-Derakma regional command on October 16, 2018. His father was one of those who took the 1996 Lorentz expedition team hostage. Since 2017, police have recorded 65 acts of violence in his group's name: road workers, teachers, health workers, pastors, an imam, a driver, and three agriculture staff. Egianus Kogoya is still at large.
Joint TNI troops were already waiting at the crossing between the Frambu and Kamundan rivers when the operations commander of TPNPB-OPM Kodap IV Sorong Raya, Manfret Fatem, walked in with two of his battalion commanders. The man wanted by police since 2020 and named as the mastermind behind the killing of four Trans-Papua road workers died at the scene. Two of his commanders died in the river.
That morning eleven people boarded a truck from Kenyam to Batas Batu, carrying rice to sell, change for customers, and a promise to be home by evening. Not one of them made it home.
Across the 28 incidents we documented, 82 Papuan civilians were killed. Some were claimed by the armed group itself. The company behind the film it calls a campaign tool received a 251,983-dollar grant from an institution led by George Soros.
The TPNPB central headquarters ordered all journalists to publish war reports only through its single channel, a day after a Papuan outlet ran a solidarity statement for a film the group said helps its campaign on military operations.
A recording uploaded on 18 August 2026 carries a call to shoot Human Rights Minister Natalius Pigai, alongside a ban on his entering Papua. The written statement behind it asks the UN to blacklist him.
For seven months, investigators at the Papua regional police traced who bought the weapons, who paid for them, and who supplied the ammunition. The case began with a single transaction at a traffic junction near Sentani's old market. It now involves 17 suspects, 298 rounds of ammunition, SS1 magazines, one homemade firearm and six rusted World War II-era barrels.
A joint TNI force first asked the armed group TPNPB-OPM Kodap IV Sorong Raya to lay down its weapons in the forest of Aifat district, Maybrat regency, on the night of Saturday 3 October 2026. The answer was live fire. Two of their commanders died, no soldier was hurt, and Manfret Fatem fled. From the site, troops seized a revolver, ammunition, a radio, and two Morning Star flags.
From a place in Papua New Guinea, the spokesperson of the TPNPB-OPM has for eight years delivered the same sentence: we are responsible, they were spies, and we will continue. This feature reconstructs his own admissions, then examines where the money for weapons actually comes from. The answer is not foreign funding. Court records name rogue state personnel, village funds, unlicensed gold mines, and levies imposed on Papuans themselves.
This site stands with the Indonesian government: Papua is a lawful part of the Republic of Indonesia, and not a single country recognises the “government” he declared. This dossier tests an exile's claims against public documents — death tolls never verified, a petition the UN never received, accounts never opened — and records who pays the price in Papua.
One teacher was killed and six wounded in Anggruk district, Yahukimo, in March 2025. Behind the corrected casualty figures lies a rarely asked question: money for services flows into these districts, yet no budget line protects the people who teach in them.
Two teachers from Toraja were killed on 8 and 9 April 2021 in Beoga district, Puncak regency. Two days later, 12 classrooms and teachers' houses had been razed, and about 400 children had lost their place to study. The government put the damage at 7.2 billion rupiah. What never entered anyone's calculation: the cost of protecting the people who teach there.
The New Zealand civilian pilot landed at Paro on 7 February 2023, then vanished from the outside world for 19 months. This is the full account, from the first day to the handover in Jakarta — including what remains disputed.
For 13 years he carried passengers and supplies along the grueling and dangerous Trans Wamena–Nduga route, sacrificing himself every day to meet the basic needs of the Wamena–Nduga community, yet that sacrifice was not deemed worthy by the TPNPB. His life was cruelly torn away. On 15 September 2026 he was intercepted at the Danau Habema junction, forced on camera to declare support for a free Papua, then shot and burned inside his own vehicle.
Organizational and fundraising tracks can be checked. To state that money finances armed groups, a chain of evidence is needed that connects giver, recipient, transaction and use.
