Laili Khairnur

Indonesia is vulnerable to conflicts, especially the interplay of natural resources, ethnic, and religion conflicts, the effects of which are felt the hardest by women and children. Laili has created a democratic citizenship mechanism led by women that brings citizen resilience to any potential conflicts in Indonesia.

Laili uses democratic citizenship to address the interplay of ethnic, religious and land conflicts and reduce inequalities and discriminations on the basis of these divisions. Recognizing that women could play a key role in all three areas, Laili developed a mechanism for women to improve their organizing skills by building a network that initially works to increase family income and contribute to food sovereignty. The women’s group network is inclusive in the design and practices – members of the groups come from different ethnic and religious backgrounds – to prevent ethnic and religious conflicts from the very beginning. Once the group begins to work together around food and supporting their families, the organizing model expands and adapts to the community’s needs, and in the process begins to shift the hyper-masculine culture in West Kalimantan’s traditional society.

This organizing mechanism also allows women to participate in policy change in natural resource management in order to secure their land rights against annexation by concession holders. To ensure the application of the policies, Laili developed a local participatory monitoring mechanism that allows women and other local leaders to conduct field monitoring against illegal practices of concession holders, supported by the use of technologies (drone and GIS).

Laili then connects her grassroots level organizing with national and global public campaigns. In addressing palm oil companies’ unsustainable practices and illegal annexation of land, often financed by the World Bank’s International Finance Cooperation (IFC), Laili and her organization, Gemawan, together with a network of national and global civil society organizations successfully made IFC changed their investment strategies in the palm oil plantation sector and halted the financing to some companies. This strategic litigation model has been replicated in Maluku to address mining issues and has also used as a best practice reference in Sarawak, Cambodia, the Philippines, and Latin America.

West Kalimantan, on the island of Borneo, is facing an unprecedented loss of rainforest due to development and agriculture, exacerbated by a lack of policies and poor implementation of policies in natural resources management. Regional Spatial Planning, which zones areas for productive use, protected forest, customary land, and individual ownership, is not yet available for the region. Corruption is rife – for example, land concession holders tampering with documentation to annex land from local people is still a common practice. The exploitation of the people and the land by big businesses is even supported by global institutions like the IFC (International Financial Corporation). To the Dayaks and other ethnic minorities who call Kalimantan home, the rainforest is not just an economical resource but also a cultural identity, and many fear that along with the decrease of the forest, their culture will also dwindle. Unfortunately, the central government plans to make Indonesia’s center of palm oil plantation in West Kalimantan. Forests and agricultural land cultivated by small farmers with no ownership certificates would be converted into palm oil plantations, since on paper, this land is considered un-utilized (idle) and unproductive, and therefore easy to dispossess indigenous people of their land.

However, land dispute conflict and discrimination between different ethnic groups complicate the situation and have prevented them from working together against annexation threats from concession holders. Immigration policies during the Soeharto regime in the 1980s encouraged migration to the region, which led to resentment of local indigenous populations over competition for land, resources, and power and triggered communal conflicts. In the past two decades, Indonesia witnessed episodes of communal violent conflicts in West Kalimantan, Maluku, Poso, and Papua. In West Kalimantan particularly, over a thousand people died and hundreds of thousands were internally displaced. Millions of people continue to live with trauma from the violence and community disintegration due to stereotypes and stigma. This has had ripple effects in other aspects of life. For example, because of prejudices against Dayaks and Catholics, people from these communities are less likely to access financial services from the main local bank, the Pancur Kasih Credit Union, even when they need it.

Women who have made attempts to build peace have instead been grossly underestimated due to their traditionally subordinate role, especially around public matters. Women's political participation is limited by the heavily rooted patriarchal culture. In the traditional culture of West Kalimantan, men lead, and women are always behind the scenes, especially around natural resource management. Women have limited access and control of resources and no voice in decision-making, even as local communities are facing one of the largest shifts in their environment, with massive forest conversion to palm oil plantations that threaten their livelihood and home.

When faced with this pressing environmental issue, Laili realized that progress would only be made by addressing land use, ethnic tension, and women’s rights all together. She also saw the potential in engaging women to play the key role in tackling these overlapping issues. Laili is building a network of women’s groups at different levels, strengthening them with knowledge, skills, attitudes, and behaviors to exercise and defend their democratic rights and responsibilities in society. She began by building small groups of women to hold health and income generation activities such as vegetable gardening and black rice planting. Laili creatively chose these activities as an entry point so that her work would not be perceived as a threat by the male partners of the women and traditional male village leaders. Vegetable gardening also contributed to meeting both the family’s needs and community food sovereignty. Moreover, it sustains and protects local indigenous food crops that are environmentally friendly and gives respect to the variety of local foods.

Laili then provided these women with civic education to help get themselves organized to protect their land and forest. Since these groups had proven themselves to the larger community and male authorities, showing the women as key contributors to their families’ economy and livelihood, the reaction of the rest of the community was largely positive, especially from village leaders. The women received an introduction to critical awareness on political and economic sovereignty and leadership training, and over time, began to take on leadership roles in the community. Now, in each of the villages, there is a vibrant and active women’s group demonstrating leadership. Laili gets the women’s groups connected in the district and provincial levels. In addition to bringing change to the lives of women and the community, Laili reversed the traditions from restriction to full support of women participating in defending their rights. Laili’s leadership and passion in cultivating women leaders have established 50 village women’s groups across 250 villages and networks in 10 cities/districts across West Kalimantan, which is now being replicated in other provinces in Sumatra Island. With four branch offices, her organization Gemawan now has 35 staff and mobilizes up to 50 volunteers from the communities and different universities. In support of her replication model, in the near future, Laili is planning to set up a training and learning center in West Kalimantan and in the upcoming new provinces and establish Gemawan as the Centre of Excellence in Indonesia.

Addressing ethnic religious prejudices and social stigma, Laili applies inclusive organizational designs and practices. She sets diversity in gender, ethnic and religious backgrounds as one of Gemawan’s organizational principles. She also brings the different ethnic groups to work together in the social forestry and advocacy program activities which overtime has broken down the community disintegration, religious stereotypes, and stigma. Furthermore, Laili together with women and community leaders advocate for policy development at the village level that gives clear title of the land to different owners. This aims to prevent land disputes amongst community members and companies as it clarifies the spatial planning management within the village territorial administration. This regulation was developed when Laili saw an opportunity to use the State Law Number 6 of 2014 about Village Act where the Village Government has the authority to solve conflicts over spatial control and map out the village administration landscape. Moreover, Laili applied the replication of Pancur Kasih Credit Union in a non-communal fashion to break down stereotyping. The credit union will serve access to financing for the Jaringan Rakyat Kakap (JRK) – a network of farmers and fisherfolk groups that Gemawan has assisted. Now Gemawan has successfully set up two additional Credit Unions in the province. And, to facilitate further reconciliation from previous conflicts in the area, Laili has delivered humanitarian support to refugee camps through Gemawan and helped mediate reconciliation between refugees and local indigenous groups. Now, the refugees have begun to set up their own villages within the refugee camps even as the local Dayak and Sambas people are becoming more welcoming.

Laili also conducts local campaigns for new policies and laws in natural resource management. In a partnership with the District Governments of North Kayong and Kubu Raya, Gemawan empowered village facilitators in advocacy training to oversee the village policy processes and strengthen community participation to ensure fair access to land and forest tenure. Gemawan began to conduct participatory spatial mapping using drone technology to produce more accurate and precise maps. The communities have eventually succeeded in issuing the Village Regulations on Village Spatial Planning. To bring the policy advocacy to a higher level, Laili built a network of civil society organizations called CSO Coalition for Sustainable and Just Spatial Management (Koalisi Tata Ruang yang Adil dan Lestari-KTL) in 2013. The Coalition advocated for Provincial Regulation to secure and protect the rights to forests and land of indigenous and local communities against the expansion threat of palm oil and timber plantations and mining companies.

The Coalition initiated a public review and examination setting as a transparency policy advocacy mechanism to any draft Regulation, which has now become a new practice in policy advocacy in West Kalimantan and nationally. The Coalition has finally succeeded in getting regulations implemented to set the allocation of land based on zonation, including the protection of peatland and mangrove conversion to palm oil plantation. The policy advocacy campaign not only engaged the local community but also young volunteers through which Laili established the Youth School for Politics and Democracy in partnership with universities. Laili also partners with different Islamic Board Schools and has set up the Learning Center and Home Garden Development program to provides concrete learning on the application of sustainable agriculture on peatlands through non-burning land management. Six learning centers and 24 support home gardens have been established in 24 different locations.

In support of transparency practices, Laili conducts participatory monitoring on policy implementation of existing concession permits using drone and GIS (Geographic Information System) technologies. To support the field monitoring, Laili set up a complaint mechanism for villagers. When the field data reports from villagers are received, Gemawan will analyze and verify whether the sustainable claims by the companies match with the field data. Any complaints and violations conducted by the private sector will be reported and advocated through various forums and mechanisms. With this mechanism, Laili is enforcing the anti-corruption movement and advocacy for good and clean governance. Furthermore, the Coalition has trained government officers on the process of managing the concessions including monitoring companies that perpetuate unsustainable practices. In obtaining and monitoring the permit, there is also a requirement for the companies to implement Free, Prior, and Informed Consent (FPIC) – a widely adopted procedure to ensure that companies obtain meaningful consent of community members before taking over their land.

Laili also conducts global campaigns and participates in the global environmental networks. Utilizing the field data and bringing herself as the local victim, Laili made attempts to bring the case of unsustainable practices and illegal annexation of palm oil plantation by the Wilmar company, which was financed by the World Bank. Engaging with the international NGOs, Laili brought the Wilmar case to the International Finance Corporation to demand a 2-3 years pause on the global lending in order to restore the environmental and social safeguards from unsustainable practices. The campaign has been successful as the IFC changed their investment policies and strategies in the Palm Oil sector. To further the international campaign, Laili currently sits in the Round Table on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO) to demand investors and companies to do sustainable practice and also mediate for alternative conflict resolution mechanisms.

Laili Khairnur was born in 1975 to a Malay family in a poor and multi-ethnic village community in Sambas of West Kalimantan by the border with Malaysia. She was raised mostly by her father, a school head master, because her mother passed away when she was only eleven years old. Raised by a single father, young Laili healed herself and passed through the hardship, which made her an independent girl having to face life without a mother. However, she learned extensively about life, empathy, and perseverance from her father, who was a role model to her in bringing about peace in a multi-ethnic community. She learned from her father’s struggle against the authoritarian government when he affiliated himself with a non-ruling party despite him being a civil servant.

Living in a multi-cultural and multi-religious community taught Laili to respect differences from a young age and she learned that every religion teaches goodness. During her high school in Islamic Boarding School, Laili witnessed her Madurese friends being discriminated by the community. Due to poverty, many of them had to drop out of school and work as household maids in Malaysia. Moved by her father’s advice to care for other people especially those in need, Laili was then active doing volunteering work during college. The inter-ethnic communal violence hit her village in Sambas in 1997 and in Sampit in 1999, and in a pivotal moment, she recalls that her father saved the life of her Madurese neighbor by helping her flee out of the village. To Laili, religious conflicts jeopardize respects to difference and diversity. So, she told herself to take this path and do something about it.

Laili went to study in Yogyakarta at IAIN Sunan Kalijaga Yogyakarta in 1993. She was very active at the Moslem Student Association (HMI). With her female colleagues, she spoke about citizenship and transformative Islam, a topic that was relatively new and wasn’t of interest to most women. Laili nominated herself to be the chairman of the HMI branch in Yogyakarta, when it was still uncommon for women to nominate themselves. During her study in Yogyakarta, Laili was already active working with non-Muslim communities including Catholic nuns for a peace-road demonstration. Later on, while working with the refugees in West Kalimantan, Laili learned that women were at the front line to keep the peace, but their voices went unheard. She also learned that the ethnic conflict was triggered by the threats over their land. So, together with her girlfriends, all from different ethnicities (Dayak, Chinese and Malay), she set up a Women Coalition for Gender Justice and Peace in 2009. She also joined Women Alliance for Gender Study (Aliansi Perempuan Kajian Gender) in Pontianak to hold congresses voicing women insights on peace making and reconciliation towards the ethnic conflicts in Kalimantan.

Upon her return to Pontianak, she joined Gemawan as a volunteer in 2001 when it was the first peace building institution in West Kalimantan. During her internship, she established a new women division at Gemawan and integrated gender into the organization’s vision and mission in 2005, transforming Gemawan into a women-led organization. Even though CSOs were dominated by men, Laili was accepted and trusted by local activists and was later elected as the Executive Director of Gemawan in 2008 due to her strong leadership and commitment. International research communities began to take note of Laili’s experience with Gemawan. However, Laili made an agreement with them to ensure that any added values of the research went back to the communities. She and Gemawan are now working with researchers to share local knowledge internationally.