Benny Wenda : A Dead Body Photograph Seller

Benny Wenda

Benny Wenda is a West Papuan independence activist. Many people who fight for freedom and human rights must know his name. He lives in the UK and his name ever be put on blacklist by INTERPOL. He was not arrested by POLRI (Kepolisian Republik Indonesia or Republic of Indonesia Police) because of raising Morning Star flag like what he always says. He was arrested because of leading a mob attacking a police post and two stores in Abepura in year 2000. A cop was killed and three others were injured. He escaped from the prison in 2011. Then he seeked for asylum in the United Kingdom.

Nowadays he campaigns independence for West Papua from Indonesia. He always says that Indonesian government was committing genocide over the indigenous of West Papua. To ensure the people, he always use dead West Papuan photographs. But we have to analyze the truth from those photographs. First question, are those people in the photographs really the victims of Indonesian cops or Indonesian soldiers brutality? Second question, how could he get those photographs? Third question, if there was genocide in West Papua, why there was no photograph of West Papuan women or children killed by Indonesian government?

Benny Wenda would like showing horrible picture like this

Benny Wenda would hate looking beautiful picture like this

For example, look on the picture below. Is that on this man's mouth blood? Is he beaten by Indonesian cop like what Benny Wenda ever said? The answer is no. His mouth gets red because he eats pinang. He could say this man's mouth was beaten by Indonesian cop because most of his European audience do not know what pinang is. Most Papuans have habit eating pinang. We can see the other part of his face looks fine. He looks sleepy and laying his head while enjoying his pinang. When you eat pinang, your mouth becomes red. It is like when you drink coffee, your teeth becomes brown or black.

Benny Wenda said on his Free West Papua Campaign page that this guy was beaten by Indonesian cop

Mouth will become red after eat pinang

This is pinang

For another example, look on the picture below. Is that an Indonesian soldier interrogating West Papuan villagers like Benny Wenda said? No. It is awkward to interrogate someone on an open space like that. Even it would be more illogical if he was interrogating three people while he was alone. We can see on the action films. Usually there must be more than one interrogators and one interrogated person. It would be more logical if we said this as a warm conversation between a soldier and the civilians. TNI (Tentara Nasional Indonesia or Indonesian National Army) has good relationship with the civilians.

Benny Wenda said on his Free West Papua Campaign page that this soldier was interrogating the villagers

Two Indonesian soldiers cleaning a school together with the students in Workwana (near PNG border)

This is what we could say as interrogation

Let us go to the first question. Who are they in those pictures? It would be very nonsense if Indonesian police or Indonesian army tortured or killed a civilian then took and shared the photograph to the public. For making a comparison, it would be nonsense if US marines shared photographs how they torture the prisoners in Guantanamo. What if they were victims of criminal action? What if they were the victims of tribal war? What if they were tortured or killed by the separatist rebels themselves? These questions make sense those photographs. He used those questionable photographs to blame Indonesia.

Second question, how could he get those pictures? There is a group which affiliated to Benny Wenda within West Papua named KNPB (Komite Nasional Papua Barat or West Papua National Commitee). They usually make demonstration and force the people to join them. Sometimes their demonstration becomes riot. What if Benny Wenda got those photographs from this group? They could give every story he wants to listen. They could give every photographs he wants to see. He just needs to make a description over the photograph to make Indonesia look bad.

A KNPB member provoking the civilians to join KNPB's demonstration by distributing flyers

For the last question, why there is no photograph of dead West Papuan women or children? Because the "genocide" which he always say does not exist. If Indonesia government committed genocide over the West Papuans, why do they not kill West Papuan women and the children also? Why does Indonesian government build many schools and send many teachers to West Papua if the goal was to kill them all?

West Papuan elementary students singing a song happily during the class

So we have to analyze what we listen and what we see. Benny Wenda needs fake photographs to ensure the audience what he says is "true". This is how he can get very much money from the donation. He could buy an expensive house in Oxford from the donation. We agree that a photograph can change a thousand of words. But on the other hand, it can make more questions to be answered. This is why he deserves to be called as a "dead body photograph seller".