by Rus Akbar Saleleubaja
TUAPEJAT-Nelis Yunisara Samaloisa, 18, was so excited to be given the chance to take part in a journalistic video-making training that she left her village, Nemnemleleu in South Sipora of Mentawai Islands, a day earlier than expected to make the 67-kilometer motorcycle ride to Tuapejat, the island’s main town, where the course was held.
Nelis was one of ten participants selected to take part in the three-day Journalistic Video Training for Indigenous Women in Mentawai, held by the Citra Mandiri Mentawai Foundation (YCMM) in Tuapejat, on June 17-19, 2021.
“I want to learn and get new knowledge on how to take video shots, be good at editing them, so that I could later make videos about my village and neighboring ones,” Nelis said during her training.
The nine other participants were all active members of indigenous communities from various villages in the Mentawai Islands, such as Nemnemleleu, Matobe, Goisok Oinan, Saureinuk, Sipora Jaya, Sidomakmur and from Tuapejat itself.
Pinda Tangkas Simanjuntak, head of the YCMM office in Tuapejat, said that the participants were selected based on the recommendations of a number of communities and partners of the foundation in the Sipora region of Mentawai, such as the Pemuda AMAN, which is the youth wing of the Alliance of Indigenous Peoples of the Archipelago (AMAN), and two community empowerment organizations, the Indonesia Sheep Foundation and Field Bumi Ceria.
We asked friends of the community and partners to recommend their members to participate in the training. The criteria for selection included being able to use a smartphone, being actively engaged in the community, active on social media and available to complete the entire program.
Pinda Tangkas Simanjuntak, Yayasan Citra Mandiri Mentawai (Tuapejat)
This training was the fourth in a series of five held by YCMM with the support of Internews’ Earth Journalism Network (EJN) for Asia Pacific. Previous training had targeted journalists and other members of indigenous communities in Padang city and Siberut Island.
YCMM initiated the training upon realizing that there were so many digital platforms available, including YouTube, Instagram and Facebook, that could be used by communities, share information and educate people about, for instance, how land loss is affecting their food security.
“However, in order to make use of these digital platforms, especially in video form, indigenous communities need to possess the necessary technical capacity to be able to tell their own narratives, on how environmental destruction and climate change are affecting them,” Pinda adds.
Participants from all four trainings will produce video stories based on their proposal and will take part in another selection process for the final training, which will focus on video editing.
Aidil Ichlas, the course instructor, said that participants are taught how to shoot video well, how to interview sources, and how to edit their footage so that they would become capable of producing interesting videos for people to enjoy. Participants are also shown examples of journalistic videos and documentaries.
They are also taught how to sharpen story angles and ideas, how to identify environmental issues, and how to plan their reporting. They are encouraged to then translate these issues and problems into film scripts that they would later work on in their respective villages.
“The videos they make must have a clear concept, so that the message they want to send is digestible by their audience, for example, a message on the importance of food self-sufficiency for indigenous communities would portray people planting a variety of local crops. They should not merely make videos on people producing sago,” Aidil said.
For Anugrah Putri, a 21-year-old from Matobe, the training has encouraged her to care more for the environment around her.
After taking part in this training I have become more motivated to be more daring in interviewing people, rooting out stories from the society. I also feel that I now have a greater sense of care (for what is taking place in the community) than before.
Anugrah Putri
Anugrah is excited to apply what she had learned by documenting the activities of people in her village, “such as the housewives who plant taro and bananas, or their husbands who go fishing, showing the livelihoods here on a daily basis near the forest,s,” she said.
Meanwhile, Dian Novita, 28, another participant in the training, proudly claims that she is now capable of shooting a video and editing it. “I will create a video about the management of toek (a wood worm endemic to Mentawai), and the plan is that in the future I will develop and manage a toek farm in Goisok Oinan,” she said.
YCMM Chairman Kortanius Sabeleake, speaking at the closing ceremony of the training, aired hope that the indigenous women of Mentawai will be more empowered and courageous in talking about their environment.
“Through this program, I hope that the Mentawai indigenous people now have the capacity to promote their conditions to outside societies, be that through videos or articles shared through social media. I hope that technology can be used to build the capacity and independence of indigenous people,” he said.