Tourism is limited to occasional foreigners, for instance, relatives from the Netherlands. More
common are the students from the Fishery Faculty of Pattimura University who come to the
village to do their fieldwork.
The village has a health center, a hospital and a resident doctor. It is the only case study
village with a banking service. There is an elementary, a junior high and a senior high school
in Hutumuri. Through a public water supply, water is piped to homes. Open storm drains
and settling tanks receive household waste. The village has electricity and TV.
The village lies close to the city of Ambon markets and transport is frequent. The road has a
hard top, but at some parts of the road are dangerous curves and steep hills. Communication
with Hutumuri is difficult and can be done by mail only. Hutumuri has no telephone or radio
connections. Toisapu, on the other hand, has two telephone lines (one public and one private).
Employment
Hutumuri has a large forest-garden area and 85% of the people are farmers. Most fishers
work only in the calmer season. The number of full-time fishers in Toisapu is less than 15.
Over the past years, the number of farmers and fishers has decreased. Droughts and natural
calamities have caused a great loss of crops. For the fishers, the costs of fishing equipment
and taxes have increased. As a result, more and more people are switching to other occupations.
The number of vendors has increased to 45. The number of laborers (house construction,
furniture) is almost the same as before 1979, i.e., more than 50 people. There were very few
government employees before 1979 because there was no high school and no health center at
that time. Now, one in ten villagers is a present or pensioned government employee.
15.2.1 Village government
In 1979, when the new government structure was implemented in Hutumuri, the saniri negeri
(traditional council) was replaced by the LMD. Three of the five former clan leaders (kepala
soas) obtained positions as heads of government affairs, general affairs and development affairs
respectively. The two remaining leaders obtained informal positions as RTs (leaders of
neighborhood units). However, as RTs, they were subject to their former equals. For clan
leaders of high prestige and status, it was an important demotion. As a result, they never
functioned in the formal village structure.
The village head at the time, Lewarilla (1982-1993), also abolished the appointment of the
village head based on the adat system. When he passed away, no new leader was elected and
only in 1996 - after a three-year period of interim leadership - was J. Lilipory, aged 58,
inaugurated as the new village leader of Hutumuri.
At the inauguration, the LKMD was installed, but a real village government (LMD) was never
established. Instead of the representatives from the adat institutions, the church, the PKK,
and the KUD that normally has seats in the LMD, the village is governed by a group of
influential villagers. People do not support the LMD, but neither have they confidence in the
higher government levels who failed to question the village head about the LMD and passively
accept his reports about its activities.
198 An Institutional Analysis of Sasi Laut in Maluku, Indonesia