Military families protest eviction

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.