Reclamation project jinxed from the outset

The Jakarta City administration's plan to reclaim part of the Jakarta Bay for commercial projects has sparked controversy. The Jakarta Post's reporters Bambang Nurbianto and Tertiani ZB Simanjuntak look into the issue.

Jakarta has witnessed rapid development in the last three decades, making it increasingly more difficult and expensive to acquire land for development.

Reclamation of the city's northern coastal areas, as a result, was deemed the right move to provide new land for development projects.

Since the 1990s, the Soeharto administration had been pursuing the project to reclaim about 2,700 hectares of sea along the 32- kilometer northern coast.

To legalize the project, Soeharto then issued Decree No. 52/1995 on the implementation of the reclamation on July 13, 1995, followed by the issuance of Bylaw No. 8/1995 by the City Council on Oct. 6.

The project has been controversial since the very beginning. The general public, especially activists and environmentalists, have opposed it, saying that it would only bring about environmental and social damage.

But nobody dared oppose Soeharto at that time. And former minister of environment Sarwono Kusumaatmadja had to agree to it and issued an Environmental Impact Analysis (Amdal), which gave the green light for the implementation of the project.

Fortunately, the project did not materialize at the time because of the economic crisis which hit the country at the end of 1997 and the downfall of the former authoritarian president Soeharto in May 1998.

But now, Governor Sutiyoso has revived the project, saying that property development in the east, west, and south had reached its limit.

"It (reclamation) is the only way for the city to expand land which is badly needed to support the fast growing city," argued Sutiyoso.

The governor, as well as city officials, have used almost every occasion possible to introduce the project. They often mentioned the bad condition of the coastal areas, including the slums and poor facilities.

They said if the reclamation project was implemented, the area would be converted into modern facilities like exclusive houses, condominiums, hotels, office buildings and other elite commercial facilities.

In the whimsical imaginings of Sutiyoso, Jakarta's northern coastal area would be like other world class waterfront cities like Singapore, Tokyo, Osaka, Hong Kong and Sydney.

But again, the project sparked protests from the public, particularly activists and environmentalists. They said that it would certainly cause serious damage to the surrounding environment and residents.

First, the project would cause seawater levels to rise another 12 centimeters resulting in floods.

Second, it would spark social conflict as thousands of fishermen from Kamal Muara, Muara Angke, Muara Baru and Kampung Luar Batang would lose their source of income.

Third, it would damage the marine ecosystem as some 330 million cubic meters of sand would be needed to reclaim the land.

And fourth, it would worsen pollution around the Kepulauan Seribu (Thousand Islands) regency due to activities caused by the reclamation process and the utilization of the reclaimed land.

When the issue became a public debate in early 1995, Sarwono revealed the project would also compound the impact of global warming, which had caused the melting of ice at the poles.

The melting of the polar caps has resulted in a rise in sea levels, including in the Jakarta straits, where many small islands, including Air Kecil, Payung Kecil, Ubi Besar, Ubi Kecil, Dapur, and Gosong Pebelokan, have submerged.

"More islands in the area will disappear if the project is implemented," he said at that time.

"It is a violation of environmental principles," Longgena Ginting of the Indonesian Forum for Environment (Walhi) said when meeting House Commission VIII for environment affairs recently.

It seems that debate surrounding the reclamation plan may not end in the near future as the battle between the two opposing parties becomes more heated.

It all started in February when State Minister for the Environment Nabiel Makarim issued Decree No. 14/2003 to reject the project. He also demanded that President Megawati Soekarnoputri revoke Presidential Decree No. 52/1995, which became the legal basis for the project.

Even though Nabiel said that the decree was final, the city administration has made every effort to revive the project.

Governor Sutiyoso and his officials were upset after learning about the decree and in response to it, made an emotional statement, saying that he would ignore it. He argued that based on regional autonomy law, the project could be implemented without the minister's approval.

The decree has sent city officials, scurrying to find reasons and justifications to make the giant project possible.

The city administration worked in cooperation with the University of Indonesia's Research Center for Applied Geography to organize a public debate, which, according to several environmentalists, was only meant to justify the project.

Representatives of the organizations that launched strong opposition to the project, such as Walhi and the Indonesian Center for Environmental Law (ICEL), were not invited to the event.

The city administration also planned to take Nabiel's decree to the State Administrative Court. The city administration and BP Pantura sought a court decision to overturn the decree, but they later canceled the plan after realizing that they did not have the right to sue Nabiel.

According to Law No. 5/1986 on the State Administrative Court, a lawsuit can only be filed by an individual or group who has directly suffered from a written order or policy issued by the authorities or civil servants.

Meanwhile, the deputy assistant for Amdal affairs to the state minister of the environment, Karliansyah, insisted that the minister's decision was final because it was based on the results of a study on the environmental impact of the project.

He said that the analysis did not present any solution to the various social and environmental problems that could result from the project, therefore the document could no longer be used as a reference to endorse the project.

"If the city administration wants to make a similar project along the northern coastal area of Jakarta, it should present a new analysis," said Karliansyah.

And now, in an effort to seek legal grounds for the reclamation plan, city officials are preparing a new analysis. But they insist that they will not seek the approval of the state minister of the environment as they believe it only needs the endorsement of the Regional Environmental Impact Management Agency (Bapedalda), which is under the auspices of the governor.