`Govt misses refugee relocation target by a mile'

`Govt misses refugee relocation target by a mile'

M. Taufiqurrahman, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

The government, already weighed down with political and economic
problems, seems to have missed its target of concluding the
resettlement of hundreds of thousands of refugees, a program it
had planned to complete by the end of last year.

The head of the United Nations Office for the Coordination of
Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), Michael Almquist, told The Jakarta
Post on Friday that there were still 400,000 internally displaced
persons in a number of conflict-prone zones around the country.

Earlier, Minister of Social Affairs Bachtiar Chamsyah said
that his ministry had succeeded in sending home a large number of
refugees, leaving only around 50,000 people displaced from their
homes.

"I don't know how the minister came up with that number, but
in Medan, where people from the neighboring province have sought
refuge, there are still around 50,000 displaced persons,"
Almquist said referring to Aceh.

He also told the Post that given the immense number of
internally displaced persons in the country, it was unlikely that
the government would succeed in returning all the refugees to
their homes by the end of this July.

He added: "There are still a significant number of refugees in
some regions affected by ethnic conflicts, such as Maluku and
Central Kalimantan".

In Maluku, the conflict between Muslim and Christian groups
has led to the displacement of people of different faiths from
their homes. In the case of the bloody conflicts in Central
Kalimantan, where migrant Madurese were subjected to a savage
pogrom by the native Dayaks, the former were forced to flee back
to their native island of Madura.

Bachtiar said that his ministry had found great difficulty in
returning the Madurese to their former homes in Central
Kalimantan as the indigenous inhabitants refused to accept them.

He also said that his ministry had now suspended a program to
provide relief aid as the assistance provided had time and again
been misused by opportunists.

"Some people fake identification papers to make money by
pretending to be a refugee, when in fact they are quite well-off
and have no right to receive the assistance," he explained.

The minister said that a team from his ministry was conducting
an investigation into the exact number of refugees.

Against this backdrop, the ministry had converted the relief
program for refugees into a poverty eradication program, he said.

"For fiscal 2003, the Ministry of Social Affairs has allocated
Rp 700 billion (US$ 78 million) for the resettlement of refugees
and Rp 200 billion for the poverty eradication program," he
explained.

Saying that the amount of the resettlement funds for refugees
was too high, he suggested that the poverty eradication program
should be strengthened to help the remaining refugees across the
country.

Separately, Almquist said that his office had provided US$1.3
million to help the Indonesian government return internally
displaced persons to their homes.