JP/5/UNDP
JP/5/UNDP
Electricity returns in Maluku's formerly riot-torn areas
M. Azis Tunny
The Jakarta Post/North Maluku
While residents in North Sumatra and Java are experiencing
electricity blackouts, North Maluku residents have again begun to
enjoy electricity services since Thursday.
Electricity has returned to 10 remote subdistricts here
after United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and the
European Union (EU) repaired electricity networks that had been
destroyed in sectarian violence in 2000.
The rehabilitation project costing Euro 426,954 had taken
place since March and will benefit thousands of people living in
the 10 remote subdistricts of South Halmahera regency, North
Maluku. The project has reinstated, among others, a 20 kilovolt
electrical relay station in the area.
Patrick Sweeting, head of Crisis Prevention and Recovery Unit
with the UNDP's Indonesia operations, said that the project was
aimed at, among others, encouraging displaced persons to return
to the 10 remote subdistricts.
The project was also aimed at providing electrical
infrastructure to support crucial public services such as
hospitals and schools, said Sweeting during the project
inauguration in the Wayauwa subdistrict in South Halmahera. The
project inauguration on Thursday was attended by North Maluku
governor Thaib Armayn and EU ambassador to Indonesia Jean
Breteche.
Earlier, the UNDP had repaired electricity networks in Galela
and South Tobelo districts in North Halmahera.
Besides the electricity rehabilitation program, the UNDP will
also soon embark on another program to support post conflict
recovery in North Maluku. The program is called the Development
Peace Program.
Foreign donors have been actively pouring money to Maluku
after the area was rocked by sectarian violence in 1999. Bloody
clashes between Muslims and Christians killed thousands of people
and displaced tens of thousands people. The conflict subsided
only in 2002 after a government sponsored peace pact was signed
by the warring parties in South Sulawesi.