House demands closure of Bojong dump
House demands closure of Bojong dump
Tony Hotland, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta
Members of the House of Representatives recommended on Tuesday
the closure of the controversy Bojong dump in Bogor, south of
Jakarta, as its presence violated land zoning regulations.
A team of legislators, set up following violent protests by
Bojong residents against the dump that led to riots, also said
that the local administration should be held responsible for its
presence, while the dump must be relocated.
Team head Sonny Keraf, from House Commission VII for energy
and the environment, said the construction of the site had
violated Bogor Bylaw No. 27/1998 stipulating that the area in
question is designated as a residential, tourism and agricultural
area only.
"Thus, (the Bogor administration) also violated Law No.
42/1992 on land zoning which stipulates that it is imperative to
abide by the stipulated zoning regulation," the former state
minister of the environment said.
This fact, Sonny added, had even been acknowledged by both the
dump users, the Jakarta and Bogor administrations, during
previous hearings with the team.
"Besides, the dump is hazardous to local residents as it is
located near a residential area and could affect their health,"
he said.
Constructed in 2003, the dump was meant to take in tons of
waste from Jakarta, which had been facing difficulties handling
its growing waste of over 6,000 tons per day.
When fully operational, the Bojong facility would have the
capacity to process 2,000 tons of waste.
Jakarta currently relies on its Bantar Gebang dump, located in
Bekasi, to handle its daily trash.
During the last trial run of new waste processing equipment at
the Bojong facility in November last year, the dump operator PT
Wira Guna Sejahtera was stopped by angry residents who had
earlier attempted to boycott the trial by blocking the road to
dump trucks.
The Bojong residents later gathered outside the site to
protest, but the protest turned violent after several people
vandalized PT Wira's office.
As the police fired shots into the crowd to stop the riot,
several residents were injured and had to be hospitalized.
A number of police officers were severely reprimanded for
using force to quell the protest, and several Bojong residents
were detained and tried for causing damage to the dump.
Members of the Bogor Regency Council have said they would
prefer that the dump suspended its operations indefinitely and,
if possible, found a new site.
Since the construction of the site was against the regulation
on land zoning, said Sonny, the Bogor administration had also
violated government regulation No. 27/1999 on environmental
impact analysis, which the administration must conduct before
granting an approval for a dump site.
"They should have never have given the go ahead to the dump
operator without conducting the environmental analysis for the
proposed dump site, aside from the fact that there was no
mechanism to inform the public on how this dump would affect the
neighboring area," he said.