No peace without justice<\/p>\n
By Elizabeth Collins<\/p>\n
PALEMBANG (JP): \"No longer do we enjoy life\/There's no bright
\nhope for tomorrow\/Attacked by garbage, polluted air above\/Our
\nland is now full of haunted villages.<\/p>\n
\"Society has begun to feel skeptical\/Security men still wield
\nan iron fist\/Life is hard, searching for a mouthful of rice\/
\nBecause sprouting crops are attacked by pollution.\"<\/p>\n
These verses (pantun) were composed by a fisherman living in a
\nvillage downstream from the paper and pulp factory of PT Tanjung
\nEnim Lestari (PT TEL), which was opened in Muara Enim, South
\nSumatra, in January 2000.<\/p>\n
Under the New Order, a small group of military and civilian
\nelites closely associated with Soeharto monopolized the
\nexploitation of natural resources, including forest, mining and
\nplantation industries.<\/p>\n
Throughout lowland South Sumatra, corporations owned by
\nSoeharto cronies and members of the Soeharto family or
\nmultinational corporations were granted concession to the use of
\nvast areas of forest lands for industrial forest estates and palm
\noil plantations.<\/p>\n
The villagers in the area of the PT TEL concession say that
\nthey were never consulted about the confiscation of their land.
\nThey were simply told they could become laborers working for the
\ncompany on road and infrastructure construction and in transport.<\/p>\n
Like other corporations given concessions in South Sumatra, PT
\nTEL used military forces for security and to intimidate villagers
\nwho resisted the takeover of land. Protesting villagers were
\naccused of being communist (PKI) because opposing development was
\ntantamount to being communist.<\/p>\n
As villagers realized that they would be impoverished because
\nwhat they could earn as unskilled laborers was much less than
\nthey had formerly earned from their rubber trees, opposition to
\nthe PT TEL factory grew.<\/p>\n
What began as a conflict over land broadened in 1997, when the
\nenvironment organization WALHI-Palembang reviewed the
\nenvironmental impact report of PT TEL and reported that the
\nfactory would dump chlorine -- a waste product from the process
\nof bleaching the wood pulp -- into the Lematang River, which was
\nthe local water supply.<\/p>\n
That same year, forest fires swept across lowland South
\nSumatra causing massive air pollution and destroying many small
\nrubber plantations cultivated by villagers.<\/p>\n
Satellite data showed that most of the \"hot spots\" were
\nlocated on industrial forest estates, including those of the MHP,
\nthe supplier of PT TEL. This was due to the fact that forest
\ndisturbed by lumbering and the maturing trees (acacia) planted on
\ntimber estates burn more quickly and intensely than natural
\nforest.<\/p>\n
When local villagers plant rubber trees, they maintain the
\nlargest trees in the forest and mimic the natural layering of the
\njungle by planting coffee or other crops (such as pepper) under
\nthe rubber trees and ground crops below.<\/p>\n
The cases of PT TEL and MHP are only two out of 136 cases of
\nconflict over land that have been registered at the office of
\nGovernor of South Sumatra. Throughout lowland South Sumatra,
\nvillagers who lost their land during the last 10 years of the
\nSoeharto regime have been impoverished.<\/p>\n
They have withdrawn their children from universities and
\ntraining institutions and are worried about how they will support
\ntheir families. They say with some despair, \"We will become a
\nvillages of thieves.\"<\/p>\n
Since the overthrow of Soeharto in May 1998, protests have
\nescalated. When compensation was finally paid to those whose
\nland was taken by PT TEL, the villagers protested because the
\namount had been reduced by 25 percent from what had been
\npromised.<\/p>\n
They accused the now former Muaraenim regent, Hasan Zen, and
\nthe now former South Sumatra Governor Ramli Hassan Basri, of
\ncorruption. On Jan. 8, 1999, thousands of residents from six
\nvillages surrounded PT TEL's new factory in a demonstration that
\nlasted eight hours.<\/p>\n
The threat of violence hung in the air. Kemas Muhammad Amin
\nof the Palembang chapter of the Legal Aid Foundation expressed
\nthe hope that South Sumatra government would pay attention to the
\nconflict before violence erupted.<\/p>\n
In November 1999, the High Court in the province announced a
\npreliminary finding that there was no evidence of corruption on
\nthe part of the regent, the Governor, his family, or Cendana
\n(Soeharto's family) in the acquisition of land by PT TEL.<\/p>\n
This news led to a large demonstration at the office of the
\nProvincial Attorney General in Palembang. A delegation of
\nvillagers also went to the office of the Attorney General,
\nMarzuki Darusman, in Jakarta to present as evidence of corruption
\nthe contracts that they had signed with PT TEL and affidavits
\nstating that they never received the amounts promised.<\/p>\n
In December 1999, protests at PT TEL's new factory turned
\nviolent. Demonstrators hurled molotov cocktails at the logs
\npiled outside the factory. Trucks used for hauling logs were
\ndamaged. Military security forces were called in.<\/p>\n
When PT TEL finally opened the factory in January 2000,
\nvillagers living on the banks of the Niru River, a branch of the
\nLematang, said that PT TEL dumped smelly, untreated waste into
\nthe River during the night. They said that after their fish catch
\nhad plummeted, and they had to dig wells for drinking water
\nbecause they could no longer drink water from the river.<\/p>\n
From the perspective of PT TEL, the company's Muara Enim
\nfactory is a development project of great benefit to the
\nIndonesian nation.<\/p>\n
A representative of PT TEL pointed out that where formerly
\nthere had been \"unproductive land,\" there was now a factory with
\njobs. He denied that PT TEL had ever been responsible for
\npollution of the Lematang River. He concluded that the protests
\nagainst PT TEL were due to unrealistic demands by local
\nresidents, because PT TEL could not supply enough jobs for
\neveryone. He urged the government to be strong to protect
\nfactories and their employees, so that investors would feel
\nsecure.<\/p>\n
Throughout South Sumatra, the pattern of conflict is similar.
\nVillagers write letters to local and national government
\nofficials protesting confiscation of land and loss of access to
\ncommunal forest resources. When this fails to bring action, they
\nmount peaceful protests at government and corporate offices and
\naccuse local government officials of corruption.<\/p>\n
Next, protests over environmental damage emerge, and finally
\nprotests over low wages and labor conditions on palm oil
\nplantations.<\/p>\n
In February 2000, several hundred representatives of farmers'
\norganizations from South and North Sumatra met with the Director
\nGeneral of the Department of Forestry and Plantations in Jakarta.
\nThey were promised that within one month their cases would be
\nsettled. Nothing has happened since then. The government's
\nfailure to act has fueled the resentment and frustration of
\npeasants.<\/p>\n
The conflict over land is tending to polarize society in South
\nSumatra. Corporations resist negotiation with villagers and
\naccuse NGOs of encouraging anarchic tendencies among the
\nvillagers. Villagers have seen that corporations can be brought
\nto the negotiating table when there is mob action against
\ncorporate property, as in the case of PT TEL, or under the threat
\nof violence.<\/p>\n
NGOs are often powerless to restrain desperate villagers.
\nIncreasingly both protesters and security forces feel justified
\nin resorting to violence. Government officials and security
\nforces justify violence as necessary to reestablish respect for
\nlaw and order. Student activists and protesting farmers justify
\nviolence on the grounds that otherwise their protests are
\nignored.<\/p>\n
However, there is another way to look at this conflict. Among
\nvillagers in conflict with multinational corporations there is a
\ndemand for a return to customs, or adat, and the system of marga
\nand pasirah (abolished in 1974).<\/p>\n
Even in a village where 80 percent of the residents are
\nvoluntary transmigrants who moved to a relatively unpopulated
\narea of South Sumatra from Lampung in the 1970s, people advocate
\na return to adat rights.<\/p>\n
This suggests that adat means something more than the
\n\"traditional rights\" of indigenous people. When pressed to
\nexplain what aspects of an idealized past they seek to institute,
\nvillagers emphasize three themes.<\/p>\n
First, a return to adat means respect for traditional
\nindividual and collective land rights. Second, villagers
\nemphasize their responsibility to their ancestors and
\ndescendants, most particularly their responsibility to provide
\ntheir children with a livelihood through education and
\ninheritance of rights to land.<\/p>\n
Third, a return to adat implies environmentally sound and
\nsustainable cultivation of the land. Villagers point out that
\ncorporations were responsible for major forest fires in 1997 and
\nhave contributed to polluting the rivers, threatening the future
\nwelfare of all.<\/p>\n
A return to adat for these villagers means a sense of
\nresponsibility for the world in which one lives. This is
\ncontrasted with what local people see as the refusal of
\nmultinational corporations to take responsibility for the
\nenvironmental and social effects of their operations.<\/p>\n
The villagers must be made partners in planning for socially
\nand environmentally responsible regional development.<\/p>\n
Elizabeth Collins, PhD is Director of Center for Southeast
\nAsia Studies, Ohio University, USA.<\/p>",
"url": "https:\/\/jawawa.id\/newsitem\/no-peace-without-justice-1447893297",
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