Bojong residents in grief after clash
The Jakarta Post Bogor/Bandung/Jakarta
Dozens of mostly women residents of Bojong village, Klapanunggal district, Bogor, West Java, had to undergo a long journey on Tuesday before being allowed to visit their husbands and brothers hospitalized with gunshot wounds after Monday's clash with the police over the opening of a waste processing facility.
National Commission on Human Rights member M.M. Billah received complaints from the women on how they were denied access to the Sukanto Police Hospital in Kramat Jati, East Jakarta, and reports on family members who were still missing.
Accompanied by Billah, the residents were finally allowed to see their relatives in the hospital.
Indonesian Forum for the Environment (Walhi) deputy director Rida Saleh, who accompanied the women, said that the National Police had also given its permission on Tuesday afternoon for the families to visit the victims in the hospital.
"After a visit and a body count, it has become clear that six victims were shot, not seven as we previously thought."
Another victim was reportedly receiving treatment in the hospital for cuts.
The clash was the result of the residents' vehement opposition to the waste treatment plant, which is operated by PT Wira Guna Sejahtera and is designed to process waste from Jakarta and Bogor, which the residents believe will give rise to health problems and damage the environment.
The plant was supposed to use environmentally friendly bale press technology. However, the machinery turned out not to be suitable as it can only process non-organic waste. So, the operator converted the facility into an incinerator.
The residents' protest during the tryout of the plant on Monday turned ugly after they tried to burn down the facility. The police opened fire using live rounds, wounding six protesters as a result. They then beat and detained 33 others.
The wounded and detained protesters have been named suspects for inciting the clash.
Human rights activists immediately demanded talks with the National Police on Monday night, slamming the violence and claiming it was a gross violation of human rights.
One resident, Ontin, reported to the rights commission that her husband, Dudung, had gone missing after the disturbances.
The residents said that most of the village's young men had decided to leave home out of fear that the police would arbitrarily arrest them as suspects.
They also reported that their relatives who had been detained in the Bogor police station had been badly beaten and that at first they were not allowed to see them.
State Minister for the Environment, Rachmat Witoelar, blamed the Jakarta and Bogor administrations for their failure to disseminate information to the residents beforehand. This corroborated a statement by the West Java governor, Danny Setiawan, who said that he had never received the environmental impact analysis for the facility, which is located in a residential area.
West Java Police chief Insp. Gen. Edi Darnadi said he would facilitate a meeting between all those involved to find an amicable solution to the problem, and that he had sent internal affairs officers to question the police personnel who had been involved in the incident.