Life after eviction in Tanjung Priok
Life after eviction in Tanjung Priok
JAKARTA (JP): A few makeshift shacks were all that remained of the rows of concrete and plywood homes along Jl. Agung Karya VI in Tanjung Priok, North Jakarta on Saturday.
"At night, and when it rains we huddle around together," an elderly man said, amid the charred ruins of a fire that left 74 families homeless on Thursday.
Women carrying almost-naked babies wandered around the ruins vainly searching for valuables or clothing that might be salvageable.
"He hasn't got any pants left," a woman said of her baby.
For an indefinite period pieces of cardboard will serve as their beds.
A few more tents were erected yesterday.
"Now we have to watch out for officials who might come again," Ernawati, another woman said.
"I can't imagine what else they want to tear down or burn."
"Even animals have cages," said Chairul forlornly.
Tents had replaced some homes since the first demolition last month. On Thursday, residents said mayoralty officials poured gasoline on their rebuilt homes and tents, and set fire to the property.
Though lacking ownership papers, residents said they paid up to Rp 2 million (US$853.61) to military personnel for the plots 13 years ago.
"We didn't live here for free," Chairul said.
But on Thursday the Tanjung Priok scavengers, bicycle taxi drivers and rice vendors, who earned at least Rp 5,000 a day, joined the statistics of the city's homeless and began to live like refugees in a war zone.
Almost 700,000 Jakartans "with social problems" are targeted for assistance by the social office agency. These include vagrants and street children, beggars, prostitutes and former convicts.
Additionally last year the municipality strove to gain presidential funds for 15,804 poor families. Thousands more are estimated to live below the official poverty line for Jakarta, which is monthly earnings of less than Rp 50,000 a month.
The children on the razed site already look like vagrants. They had resumed school after an absence of three weeks but no one was doing any homework and many did not have a change of clothes from their uniforms.
Hardly anyone had bathed since Thursday. Money to buy food was quickly running out. Clean water was nowhere in sight.
Residents insist officers from the public order office, or the security officials standing by, had never produced a demolition order, or a notice authorizing the burning.
A demolition order contains orders for residents to tear down their own homes within a given period before officials conduct the operation themselves.
Residents said they would check their fate with the city council again. "Is there anything better we should do?" Rochani, a residents spokesperson asked.
Residents said the only official notice received was from the mayoralty. It was dated March 22 and addressed to inhabitants of the subdistricts of Papanggo, Sunter Agung and Sungai Bambu.
"Once we made this swamp area inhabitable and paid fees, all three subdistricts said we were their residents," Rochani said.
"Now we're just like goats behind this fence."
The notice says the area will be made into a park. Construction workers putting up the new fence said it was ordered by the nearby automobile company.
Before the notice was issued, Rochani said a senior manager of the company "offered help" to the residents. He said the area was going to be cleared.
"But he's always in a meeting when we call him," she said. On Friday the city-owned water company, PDAM Jaya, acknowledged to councilors their plan for a water pipeline project, for which residents will be compensated.
"But the councilor said the sum, and when we will be paid, is not clear," Rochani said. (anr)