Border villages along the PNG Indonesian Border in West Sepik Province; have been struggling to access basic government services.
Scotchiau is one of the 4 villages that share the border with Indonesia.
The people walk for 2 hours to access health services.
Located in the Vanimo Green District of Sandaun Province, Scotchiau is one of the 4 villages along the PNG Indonesian border.
Getting to Scotchiau takes a little over 2 hours by road.
The villagers here have come up with an initiative to start up their own Cocoa Project.
The Scotchiau, Tapos, Sogros or STS Cocoa Estate was set up to sustain the livelihood of villagers after 600 hectares of their forest was cleared for logging activities.
More than a million cocoa seedlings have been planted.
The project is also addressing sustainable forest management by replanting balsa and Kwila on the cleared land.
Villagers have raised concerns about lack of government services reaching them.
Manase Jordon is a ward councillor within the Bewani Wutung LLG.
He wants the government to seriously address the issue of border security since there is no presence of police and defence there.
Second time Member and Opposition leader, Belden Namah, blamed the Border Development Authority for not assisting border villages.
The members together with landowner chairmen of the logging companies have gone into a housing scheme to relocate the villagers.
More than 15 houses have been built just 5 meters away from the border.
There is presence of government authorities including, BDA, Customs and Defence at the Wutung Border however, this is not the case at the other 3 villages.
https://youtube.com/watch?v=iKVnBtSYll4%3Ffeature%3Doembed%26wmode%3Dopaque%26showinfo%3D0%26showsearch%3D0%26rel%3D0
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