Courts favor the rich in land disputes: Lopa

JAKARTA (JP): Indonesia's courts of law have a tendency to favor the rich and powerful in land conflicts, the Secretary- General of the National Commission on Human Rights said.

Baharuddin Lopa said many land conflicts tried in court have ended with the rulings favoring the rich people acquiring the land.

Most judges only look at the legal formalities of the conflict, particularly the possession of land titles, Lopa told a seminar on land issues on Thursday.

Most court rulings have been detrimental to the poor because they often do not possess land titles, which they may have neglected to process out of ignorance, or owing to difficulty in getting the proper certificates, he said.

He suggested that judges also look at the sociological aspects of the land conflicts they are trying.

Land disputes now top the list of complaints brought before the rights commission, he told the seminar, which was jointly organized by the Student Senate of the School of Law of Jakarta University and the Association of Law Student Senates in Indonesia.

Several of the land conflicts in Indonesia in recent years were highly politicized, with many turning violent. Hundreds of thousands of people have been displaced as their houses and farmlands are acquired for reservoirs, industrial estates, plantations, residential areas and golf courses.

In many land disputes, the titles to the land were in the hands of the buyers, usually either the government or a privately owned company, Lopa said. This is because the government and companies have easier access to land certificates, he added.

Security officers often side with the strong parties in land conflicts rather than with the evicted people, he said, citing collusion as a probable cause.

Lopa said that because of the mounting number of land disputes referred to the human rights commission, it has drawn up some basic guidelines on land ownership issues.

The guidelines underline the need for the party who is procuring the land to provide an alternative location for those evicted, in addition to financial compensation, he said.

"This must be provided before the people are evicted or their houses demolished," he said.

Also, those who buy land from poor villagers are encouraged to give the displaced occupants equity in whatever venture they are building on the land, or to hire the villagers as workers, Lopa said.

Failure to involve the local people could have social repercussions which would endanger the company's presence on the appropriated land, he said.

In many land disputes, if compensation was offered to the evicted villagers, it was too little to enable them to buy new property elsewhere, he said. (16)