Fisherfolk to occupy new dwellings

Leony Aurora, Jakarta

For an area that will be vacated within one day, Kali Adem in Muara Karang district, North Jakarta, was awfully quiet. Most of the inhabitants preferred to sleep amid the Friday afternoon heat. Nobody was packing.

"Yes, we're going to move on Saturday," Rawut, a member of the Traditional Fishermen Union (SNT), whose house was demolished by the North Jakarta administration last October, told The Jakarta Post on Friday.

The 44-year-old fisherman does not have many things to pack. His wife, four children, and most of his belongings went with the first group, who moved back to their hometown Indramayu in West Java two months ago. Some 100 other families, who were left behind, will follow on Saturday evening.

Each family will live in a 21-square-meter house on a two- hectare plot of land in Song Beach, Indramayu. They will have to pay monthly installments of Rp 90,000 (US$9.54) to the municipality. Rawut estimates that the payments will continue for 10 years.

The complex was built especially for the families of fishermen that belong to the union -- partly in recognition of their resistance to the evictions.

Public order officers evicted more than 1,000 families and demolished their stilt houses on the banks of Muara Angke river. Members of the union are the minority, who stubbornly rejected Rp 500,000 as compensation for their houses, which most families had lived in for more than 20 years.

"I'll be back within one week," said Rawut. The fishermen cannot make a living yet in Indramayu, as they need bigger boats to sail the deeper sea in that area, and different equipment to catch the different kinds of fish there. For the time being, they will live on their boats, just as they have done since the evictions, while their wives and children try to adjust to their new lives in Song. "My house will be a place to rest," said Rawut.

M. Razak, a student of the Bogor Institute of Agriculture, who assisted the union, said that, possibly, the Indramayu municipality could help with the boats. "We are still discussing the options, including the cultivation of seaweed and green oysters," said Razak.

He also expressed concern that Song still lacked necessary infrastructure and services, such as regular garbage collection, street lights, and an elementary school.

Tarminah, 40, has two children in elementary school in Kali Adem. "The closest school to Song is still too far away," she said. For the sake of her children's education, she will return to Jakarta once the holiday is over.

A mother of eight cited another reason for returning to the capital. "What am I to do in Song? Here at least I can collect plastic," she said, pointing to a white sack full of plastic bottles.

For one such sack, which takes three days to collect, she receives Rp 15,000. "Not bad for the kids' pocket money."

But despite all the problems, the future Indramayu residents feel positive about the relocation. "The house may not be much -- half of the walls are not brick, just woven bamboo," said Rawut. "But, at least, we can sleep in a house of our own."