500,000 homeless as Jakarta faces housing needs

JAKARTA (JP): The capital has a hard time meeting housing needs with around 500,000 homeless people, a housing agency official said.

The main problem was not only anticipating higher population growth, but also meeting the needs of the thousands of families evicted to make way for government or private projects, Nusmardi head of the housing agency's development control said Monday.

Based on the agency's 1995 figures 478,600 of Jakarta's 7.5 million people were homeless. With an average annual two percent growth there would be about 500,000 homeless now, he said. Jakarta is now home to about 9 million people.

"But what is difficult to predict is the number of people who will be evicted. Fire victims must also be taken into account," he said.

The figure might not include the families in shacks along river banks and railways, he said.

Each year the agency aims to provide 70,000 homes including low cost houses and apartments. It hopes to meet housing needs in 15 years.

"But we can only meet a little more than half the annual target," he said.

On Monday President Soeharto said the government allocated Rp 1.5 trillion to support the building of 110,000 low-cost houses nation-wide in the 1997-1998 period.

Meanwhile failure to meet the target means the number of homeless just keeps growing, he said.

This is why the agency supported a National Development Planning Board (Bappenas) proposal for compensation to be provided in public projects which affect more than 20 homes.

He said the proposal was made during a July seminar on a sustainable Jabotabek (Greater Jakarta). Evicted residents complaining to the city council, for instance, are often told they have no right to compensation from public projects.

However a legal expert at the seminar, Koesnadi Hardjasoemantri, said a 1993 presidential decree on land acquisition for public interest infers landowners have a right to be paid market rates.

At the seminar World Bank consultants also said vital infrastructure projects like the Flood Control system would continue to be delayed because residents would continue to resist unless they got adequate compensation to move elsewhere.

"We supported the Bappenas idea because when people cannot afford to build homes again they add to our burden," Nusmardi said.

Nusmardi said the agency still hoped the private sector would take a role in building cheap houses or apartments.

The agency only manages to build about 3,000 of its annual target of 10,500 cheap apartments while the state-owned housing company, PT Perumnas, builds an average 2,000 apartments. The remainder should be built by the private sector. However private developers say they would cost too much to build low cost homes due to land prices and other fees.

A 1992 gubernatorial decree rules private developers who build luxurious apartments must allocate 20 percent of their land for low cost apartments.

Nusmardi said the housing agency now planned to build more low cost apartments for rent, rather than for sale.

"It is difficult to monitor people transferring their ownership rights," he said. Several low cost apartments have been sealed by the agency because it was discovered ownership had been illegally transferred to others.

Ownership of low cost apartments may not be transferred because most were built for fire victims and former slum residents. However many people transfer their ownership rights saying they can no longer afford the monthly installments and maintenance costs. (anr)