Home Affairs Minister Tito Appreciates Housing Renovation Programme in Papua

Home Affairs Minister (Mendagri) Muhammad Tito Karnavian stated that housing issues in Papua remain significant, with many residents still lacking homes or living in substandard dwellings.

To address this, Tito commended the initiatives of the Ministry of Housing and Settlement Areas (PKP) in launching the renovation programme for Unfit Inhabitable Houses (RTLH) in Papua.

Tito expressed this appreciation following his attendance at the Preparatory Meeting for the Construction and Rehabilitation of Decent Homes in six Papua provinces, held at the Ministry of Home Affairs headquarters in Jakarta on Wednesday (15/4).

“This is an extraordinary programme from the Minister of PKP, including subsidised housing, house renovations, and others. For the house renovation specifically, they have allocated at least 21,000 [homes in the Papua region],” Tito said.

Tito agreed that no previous housing programme had been as comprehensive as the current one by the Ministry of PKP. The ministry also has special programmes for border areas, including Papua.

The scale of the programme, Tito noted, would be difficult to achieve relying solely on Regional Revenue and Expenditure Budgets (APBD). This is considering that Papua has six provinces and 42 regencies/cities.

“If we do it simply, 21,000 divided by 42 regencies/cities is about 500. How much cost would each regency/city’s APBD have to bear?” he said.

Fortunately, Tito added, this task is being handled by PKP Minister Maruarar Sirait.

“We extend our highest appreciation to the Minister of Housing, Mr Ara Sirait, for the housing programmes, including house renovations with a significant number in Papua, the Land of Papua,” he explained.

Meanwhile, PKP Minister Maruarar Sirait explained that besides the house renovation programme, his ministry is preparing several housing initiatives for Papua’s residents, such as the People’s Business Credit (KUR) for Housing and subsidised homes.

“There are also three slum areas being improved: in the main Papua, in Jayapura, then in South Papua and also in Sorong. So the programmes are extensive,” he clarified.

Also present at the forum were Deputy Home Affairs Minister (Wamendagri) Ribka Haluk, Head of the Central Statistics Agency (BPS) Amalia Adininggar Widyasanti, executives from the Committee for the Acceleration of Special Autonomy Development in Papua, as well as governors or representatives from the Papua region.