Fire victims asked to resettle

Fire victims asked to resettle

R.K. Nugroho, The Jakarta Post, Jayapura

Jayapura Mayor, Kambu, has instructed the residents of
Bhayangkara subdistrict whose homes were destroyed by fire on
Sept. 26 not to rebuild their homes in the same location, as it
was vulnerable to landslide and overlapped with some of the
town's green areas.

Kambu said on Wednesday that all the residents should leave
the area, where they have been erecting tents and other temporary
shelters since the fire, no later than Oct. 14.

"All the buildings destroyed by the fire were illegal and the
house owners did not have legal documents for the land occupied
by their former houses," he said, adding that this was the
position of the regency administration.

The mayor said that the administration could not give any
guarantees to the residents on whether they would be resettled or
given another area to live in.

"It's their own business," he said, adding that the decision
was fair.

Fire struck the densely populated Bhayangkara subdistrict in
downtown Irian Jaya, capital of Jayapura, on Sept. 26, destroying
hundreds of houses, and leaving homeless thousands of people
belonging to 985 families. No fatalities were reported.

Police have yet to reveal the cause of the fire, but an
eyewitness had earlier said that the fire originated from an
exploding oil stove belonging to a local named Bondan.

Meanwhile, the leader of Besar Kayu Pulau tribes Gaspar Sibi,
who claimed to have inherited the Bhayangkara land from his
ancestors, said he supported the mayor's decision.

"Please, don't let any buildings stand on the land in the
future," Gaspar said, adding that the land was part of a
designated green area. "We just want to avoid possible disaster.
Let the land be used for greenery."

The fire victims however demanded that the local
administration help them find a new location. "Most of us prefer
staying here to going elsewhere. We have no place to go. It's not
easy to find vacant land in Jayapura."