Jakarta lakes losing function of water catchment

Jakarta lakes losing function of water catchment

JAKARTA (JP): Many lakes in the city no longer function as
water catchment areas due to rapid development in the capital, an
official says.

Tb. M. Rais, the deputy governor for economic and development
affairs, said yesterday that many lakes have been filled and used
for residential areas.

"Most of the lakes do not properly function as water catchment
places because of illegal works to turn them into residential
areas," he said.

Rais said a gubernatorial decree has been issued to prohibit
people from developing the city's lake areas.

Unfortunately, he said, the decree is often ignored.

"But we will continue in our efforts to protect them because
their function is very important to prevent floods," Rais said.

At present there are 32 lakes throughout the city: in Grogol,
Jelambar, Pluit, Muara Angke, Melati, Babakan, Riorio and
Rorotan, Teluk Gong, Sunter Timur II, Marunda and Ulujami.

Four of them are still not protected by the decree: Teluk
Gong, Sunter Timur II and Marunda in North Jakarta, Ulujami in
South Jakarta.

Smaller

Lukman Mokoginta of the Indonesian Democratic Party (PDI)
added that the lakes are getting smaller due to residential
encroachment.

"The lake in Pluit used to be 90 hectares and now it is only
30 hectares," he said citing an example.

However, Lukman said it is nearly impossible to demolish
buildings built on the lake areas, many of which have official
building permits.

The only way to cope with the problem is to prohibit the
activities of developers and builders by refusing to issue
further development permits.

Ahmadin Achmad, the head of the city planning agency, said,
however, that any houses built illegally can be demolished.

"If they don't have permits, the city building supervision
agency can demolish them," he said.

Meanwhile, the East Jakarta mayoralty plans to build four dams
to make up for dwindling lake areas.

East Jakarta Mayor Sudarsono said recently that the dams will
be built near the site for the eastern flood canal in Cipinang
Besar Selatan and Pondok Kopi subdistrict on 40 hectares of land
owned by PT Metropolitan Development.

The government failed to find the money necessary to build the
flood canal, which was expected to cost more than Rp 1 trillion
(some US$434 million). (yns)