Military families protest eviction
Evi Mariani, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta
Representatives of residents of Siliwangi housing complex in Pasar Baru, Central Jakarta, met with the City Public Order Office on Tuesday, accompanied by their lawyers, and asked the administration to halt the plan to evict them.
They said they received a letter on Oct. 2 signed by Governor Sutiyoso, informing them that they must leave the complex. The letter claimed the land upon which the complex was built belonged to the Ministry of Finance.
"We are here to inform the administration that the ministry's land ownership certificate is not legal and demand that the administration halt the eviction plan," said Reinhard Parapat, a lawyer from the Indonesian Legal Aid and Human Rights Association (PBHI), at the meeting.
He said the ministry's certificate was issued by the National Land Agency (BPN) in 1988 while the legal dispute over the land was still in progress.
"According to Article 3 of the government regulation on land registration, the BPN cannot issue a land ownership certificate for property that is under dispute," he said.
BPN head Soebagio told the protesting residents that he could not make a decision yet, but assured them that the administration would never evict people if the action was not supported by legal documentation.
The claim to the land is being made by 27 of the original 300 families that used to live in Siliwangi housing complex. Of these, 14 families still live there.
The families had already asked the Supreme Court in 2002 to review an apparently erroneous 1998 ruling in the same case, but no progress has been made.
The dispute over the Siliwangi land started in 1981 when the government, through the then Ministry of Security and Defense, claimed a 9.4-hectare land that was home to around 300 families. Most of the families were relatives of Indonesian Armed Forces and National Police veterans, and had lived there since 1950.
The families began the registration process to obtain their land ownership certificates in 1980, but in April 1984, personnel from the Jakarta Military Command carried out a mass eviction and put a stop to the families' efforts to claim the land.
Some 55 families remained and filed a legal complaint with the Central Jakarta District Court and the High Court, both of which ruled in favor of the residents in 1989. The courts said the residents had rightful claim to the land and the eviction was a legal violation.
While the legal process was going on, the BPN issued a land ownership certificate of the disputed property to the Ministry of Finance, claiming that the ministry had purchased the land from the Ministry of Security and Defense.
Residents accused the BPN of colluding with the government in the issuance of the land certificate -- the head of BPN at that time was Lt. Col. Sarwata, formerly a legal officer with the Jakarta Military Command.
The government appealed to the Supreme Court, which overturned the ruling of the lower courts and ruled against the residents in 1998. The Supreme Court head at that time was no other than Sarwata.
The final ruling only convinced the residents that the property deal was a result of internal collusion among government institutions.
In a similar case last month, three houses in Cilandak, South Jakarta, were demolished following a claim from state insurance company PT Asuransi Jiwasraya that the land was theirs, although the Supreme Court had ruled in favor of the residents in 1997 as to legal ownership of the property.