Govt mulls revising land decree
Tony Hotland, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta
The controversial presidential decree on land acquisition may come under revision due to mounting opposition from non- governmental organizations and lawmakers, says Cabinet Secretary Sudi Silalahi.
Speaking during Monday's hearing with House of Representatives Commission II on agrarian affairs, Sudi said, however, that the process would not be straightforward.
"We'll review the criticisms but, due to the nature of the regulation, revising it will take a lot of time and thought," he said.
Presidential Decree No. 36/2005, issued recently, has sparked strong protests from non-governmental organizations and House members as it allows the government to take over land for development purposes, even if the land owner does not accept the government's compensation offer.
The Cabinet Secretariat is in charge of drafting all presidential decrees, regulations and instructions.
Commission I gave Sudi during the hearing documents that it had compiled, containing articles for consideration and points of revision for the new land decree.
Commission members were of the opinion that the decree opened chances for discriminatory measures by authorities due to the multi-interpretative meaning of "public interest", and to arbitrarily take over private land if they failed to take into account Law No. 20/1961 on the retraction of rights over land and objects on it.
They also saw room for collusion between the government and investors in the acquisition process, a gross monopoly with the establishment of an "independent price appraiser" that was appointed by the government itself, and a repressive element due to the limited negotiation period.
While the commission acknowledged that enacting the regulation was the government's right, it said legislators would serve to monitor the implementation.
Legislator Eddy Mihati said the government had actually violated Law No. 10/2004 on the enactment of regulations and laws that states any regulations involving public interests or human rights have to be accommodated in the form of a law.
"Furthermore, the House is already scheduled in 2006 to deliberate a law on land acquisition for public interests. The government probably wanted to overtake us on this issue to avoid deliberating with us," he argued.
In response, Sudi said the decree's enactment had been pushed by Minister of Public Works Djoko Kirmanto and Coordinating Minister for the Economy Aburizal Bakrie for reasons of attracting foreign investment and development purposes.
"This is an urgent situation, to ensure legal certainty for development works, such as infrastructure projects, which have been planned but are yet to commence due to legal problems," he said.
However, he failed to elaborate further on the urgency of the decree, to the disappointment of legislators.
The House has become the latest voice to demand that the government shelve the decree.
A number of non-governmental organizations are currently seeking public support to file a request for a judicial review, and plan to submit it to the Supreme Court on July 29.
Activists have condemned the decree, a renewed version of presidential regulation No. 55/1993, as it could lead to human rights problems in the future with forced evictions and intimidation -- practices common after the old regulation was imposed.