Group visits rights body over land row

JAKARTA (JP): At least 25 people claiming to be the heirs of Pangeran Arya Jipang, the former owner of the land where Hotel Ibis in Slipi, West Jakarta, is located, visited the National Commission on Human Rights on Monday to seek support for their land dispute.

The group, representing 77 heirs of Arya Jipang, arrived at the commission's office on a bus and unfurled posters stating that PT Putra Swadaya Prasetya, a private company which owns the hotel, should be brought to court.

"We want the West Jakarta District Court to hear the case because the company illegally occupied our land," the group's spokeswoman, Khotija, said.

Khotija said the court had decided to throw out the case on June 16, arguing it had no jurisdiction in the dispute since the defendant, a subsidiary of publicly listed developer PT Putra Surya Perkasa, was located on Jl. Jend. Sudirman in South Jakarta.

The group, however, has insisted that the West Jakarta court should handle the case since the disputed area is located in West Jakarta.

They have brought their argument to the Jakarta High Court through an appeal, she said, adding that the high court had yet to make a ruling on the case."

In their lawsuit brought to court in May, the group charged that the company illegally appropriated the 5,199-square-meter plot on Jl. S. Parman.

They also demanded the district court to order the company to vacate the land and provide Rp 500 million (US$45,454) in compensation for material losses.

The group's lawyer, Gelora Tarigan, said earlier that the land legally belonged to Arya Jipang, as recorded at the West Jakarta office of the National Land Agency and the state-owned Heredity Property Management Body.

PT Putra Surya Perkasa public relations head Robert P.S. said his company had studied all the land's legal aspects before investing a huge amount of money to build the hotel in 1991.

"The people are just making a claim. They are not the owners," Robert told The Jakarta Post on Monday.

He said his company was ready to take all necessary legal procedures, but refused to provide further comments.

Human rights commission member Clementino dos Reis Amaral urged the group on Monday to obtain their land title from the land agency in order to back up their claim.

Tarigan said the plaintiffs were the legal heirs of Arya Jipang as determined by the South Jakarta Islamic Religious Court on June 15, 1981. (jun)