Flood victims lament loss of documents

Muninggar Sri Saraswati, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

The floodwaters had receded, and many people had returned home. But their plight was far from over.

After trouble with the poor distribution of assistance and threatened with various diseases, many of them found that their important documents were damaged, or swept away by the floodwaters.

"I lost my ID card and my bank account book -- but I don't have time to take care of the matter, since we're still struggling to clean up," said Albert, an employee of a private company in the Slipi area of West Jakarta.

His house had been flooded by a full meter of water for two days. Albert said that he had no time to save his documents.

At the time, he said, he had to save his family first.

"I would process the documents with the city administration soon if I could, but I don't think it would go very smoothly," he told The Jakarta Post, referring to the poor public service of the city authority.

Processing such documents is notoriously complicated, involving a lot of time and energy.

Another resident spoke of a similar experience when she recalled that she, too, had to apply for new documents after her originals disappeared in the floods that struck in 1996.

"It was too complicated ... almost all of my documents were swept away by the floods, so I had to go to several offices," said Ibu Soemarsono, a resident of the Kampung Melayu area.

She had to visit the subdistrict office, two banks, and the land affairs office of the Central Jakarta mayoralty.

The entire process, she said, took six months.

"I had to go back and forth to the various offices, I lost money, time, and energy, but I had no choice," she said, adding that she spent Rp 500,000 to replace her land ownership documents alone.

She said that, at that time, she did not have to pay for the new ID card.

But an officer at the Petamburan subdistrict contested this, told The Jakarta Post that a person who loses their ID card should pay Rp 150,000.

"We can give you a temporary ID card to substitute the missing one," said Sunarya, an officer at Petamburan subdistrict. An applicant, he added, must get a reference letter from the chief of the neighborhood.

ID cards are nevertheless important. Most banks require customers who lost their bank account book to bring their ID card or a reference from police acknowledging the loss. Otherwise, the banks turn them away.

Officers at the Central Jakarta agrarian office and several banks acknowledged that the processing of missing or damaged documents requires certain procedures.

The process of document application in banks is relatively simple, but it is different at government offices, which are known for their cumbersome bureaucracy and inefficiency.

"There will be no special treatment for flood victims," a spokesman of the State Land Agency, Raden Laksamana, told the Post, referring to Government Decree No. 24/1997 on land registration.

If a land certificate goes missing, a person has to advertise for it in a newspaper. The agrarian office would then approve if there was no objection from anyone who claimed the same land after a month of the advertisement.

However, if the certificate is damaged, one does not need to place an ad, but the person does need to take an oath before the office head saying that the land certificate is damaged.

It can take months to process a land certificate, since the office has to examine eligibility of the request, said an officer.

"But if many people lose their certificates in the same area, the subdistrict office could file all their claims in one application," said Yanto, an officer at the land office.