Wed, 02 Aug 1995

West Jakarta sets up land dispute team

JAKARTA (JP): West Jakarta Mayor Sutardjianto has assigned a team to handle and settle disputes over two plots of land in Tegal Alur and Kalideres.

The team, led by the mayor's assistant for administrative affairs, Solichin, has been assigned to inspect the land and verify documents.

Solichin explained that land disputes in Tegal Alur and Kalideres arose in 1970 when the municipality widened Jl. Latumeten, Jl. Daan Mogot, Jl. Hayam Wuruk, and Jl. Gadjah Mada.

The houses of residents living along the roads were demolished. The municipality did not pay compensation to them, but instead gave them plots of land in Tegal Alur and Kalideres.

The city-owned housing developer, PD Pembangunan Sarana Jaya, provided 260 hectares of land divided into 6,000 parcels at both locations.

Sutardjianto set up the team after finding fraudulent land documents held by people illegally occupying the parcels.

Dozens of the occupants of those areas do not have proper land documents, while a number of holders of the legally certified documents have been deprived of their rights because the parcels have been sold to others by an unscrupulous official of PD Pembangunan Sarana Jaya, Solichin said.

Facilities

Some sites originally allocated for the construction of public facilities have also been sold by the corrupt official, according to Solichin.

Solichin would not name the official, but said that the municipality had fired the man, who is now still at large and being tracked down by city police.

Solichin also said that more than 500 site documents have not yet been picked up by their owners.

He stated that people who have the right to occupy the sites can pick up their documents at the West Jakarta Mayoralty office.

Fajar Panjaitan, head of Kalideres district, acknowledged that there were still some disputes over the land parcels.

"To avoid more disputes, we have prohibited anyone from taking over the parcels without letters of recommendation from the mayoralty and PD Pembangunan Sarana Jaya," he said. (29)