Farmers against dam closure

Blontank Poer, The Jakarta Post, Sukoharjo

A vocal protest from about 700 farmers outside the Colo Dam complex in Sukoharjo, Central Java, have led to a planned closure of the dam for maintenance to be delayed a month.

The authority was planning to close the dam temporarily to allow it to repair irrigation canals starting on Sept. 8.

If the authority went ahead with the plan, the protesters had threatened to resort to violence to keep the canals open.

"If the irrigation canals are closed, our paddy plants will perish," said protest coordinator and farmer Giman Yitno from Sukoharjo regency. The other farmers at the demonstration came from Sukoharjo, Karanganyar, Sragen and Wonogiri, all areas with paddy fields served by the Colo Dam.

Responding to the protest, Bengawan-Solo Water Authority chief Johan Hidayat promised to delay the closure for one month in order to allow farmers to irrigate their paddy fields.

While bowing to the farmer demands, Johan said he was disappointed they had ignored the authority's earlier warning it would shut down the dam in September.

"They should have been prepared earlier. As the result of farmer ignorance, we now have to delay the irrigation repair project," Johan said.

Lestari Mulyo Farmer Association chief Sarjanto in Sukoharjo earlier said the temporary closure of Colo dam was untimely and if the plan had been executed, it would have affected some 40,000 hectares of paddy fields in four regencies.

Suwarto, a farmer from Karanganyar regency, said thousands of farmers in his area desperately needed water from the dam as they had just planted their fields.

"Their fields are only a month old and the plants need a large amount of water," Suwarto said.