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10:39:08 pm on November 21, 2008 | # |
Schiller, Jim, Anton Lucas & Priyambudi Sulistiyanto, “Learning from the East Java Mudflow: Disaster Politics in Indonesia”, Indonesia, 85 (April 2008), 51-77.
Who is helping the Victims?
National government. 14 June 2006. The Lapindo Mud Investigation Team (Tim Investigasi Lumpur Lapindo) was set up by the responsibility of the Minister for Energy and Mineral. They stated, “the mudflow was because Lapindo’s negligence.” 8 September 2006 (till 6 April 2007). Keppres 13/2006 set up the National Sidoarjo Mudflow Mitigation Task Force (Tim Nasional Penanggulangan Semburan Lumpur Sidoarjo, Timnas PSLS). 8 April 2007. Perpres 14/2006 set up the Sidoarjo Mudflow Mitigation Agency (Badan Penanggulangan Lumpur Sidoarjo, BPLS). This is an umbrella organization that, according to Lapindo, will coordinate all relief efforts (well control, mud management, and social support).
Lapindo Brantas. 15 June 2006. Joint the District Implementation Unit (Satuan Pelaksana, Satlak), the Sidoarjo district mudflow committee. Lapindo has been involve in the management of relief efforts for displaced persons. Lapindo paid victims five hundred thousand rupiah for relocation (uang pindah), five million rupiah for 2-year rental accomodation (uang kontrak rumah), and three hundred rupiah as a monthly living allowance (jatah hidup). Lapindo says it has provided “other assistance” in addition to these funds for resettling refugees, including: an umployment wage compensation payment of seven hundred rupiah per month (to 2,288 factory workers, or 6.2 billion rupiah total), relocating compensation to ten factories (5.2 billion rupiah), other compensation to nine additional factories (47.6 billion rupiah), and grants to 306 small -and medium- size enterprises (4.3 billion rupiah). (66)
Compensation for property lost to the mud: irrigated rice fields, house gardens, and houses. The distribution of these payments has been fraught with difficulties, in part because the parties often disagree about what constitutes a fair assesment of the ruined property. … [C]onflict have resulted from Lapindo’s interpretation of ownership rights. When victims receive the compensation payment, they have to sign a deed of sale (akte jual beli) transferring the title of the submerged land and building to Lapindo. There is speculation and suspicion about why Lapindo wants to hold title to this submerged land (people think it is for future oil and gas exploration), and many farmers are unhappy with having to forfeit land ownership. Kyai Gus Maksum, a well-known local NU leader, wants to help landowners to keep the titles of their land. … The group’s supporters want to keep the title to their property in order to remain registered as local residents (warga local). (67)
A year after the disaster, Lapindo had only paid compensation for property to 129 families, while there were still 10,000 others that had claims covering 425 hectares (1,050 acres) of wet rice fields and 31,279 square meters of house gardens. (67-8)
Local government. Sidoarjo district formed Satlak in June 2006. It was formed fully three months before any official action was initiated by the national government; Timnas, it will be recalled, was not established by Presidential Decision until September 2006. The delay in the national response reflects the ongoing confusion about appropriate private (Lapindo) versus state (Sidoarjo, East Java, Jakarta) roles in the disaster. Victims of the mudflow have often been dissatified with the local agencies’ responses, as with Lapindo’s and central government’s. (68)
NGOs. There are several NGO involved in dealing the mudflow, including modernist Muhammadiyah (in the township of Sidoarjo) and the traditionalist NU, which draws its strongest support from East Java, from secular NGOs, and from tertiary institutions such as the Surabaya Instittue of Technology and Surabaya’s Airlangga University. NU played limited role in providing food and clothing donations to mud victims through two posko (communication centers). (69)
Some others (academic and professional groups). Two leading academician, Hotman Siahaan sociologist from Airlangga University and Kresnayana Yahya, statistician from Technology Institute of Surabaya held public meeting to discuss the impact of the mudflow. … The victims were supported by a group of Airlangga University Faculty of Law and Faculty of Psychology academics. (69)
18 October 2006. Walhi (Wahana Lingkungan Hidup indonesia, Indonesian Environmental Forum) coordinates a group of forty Jakarta-based lawyers to log summons charging PT Lapindo Brantas, the Government of the Republic of Indonesia, and others with violating the victims’ human rights. January 2007. Walhi filed a lawsuit in the South Jakarta district court suing the government on behalf of the victims. In December 2007, the South Jakarta district court rejected Walhi’s lawsuit agaist Lapindo and the government. In February 2008, Walhi logged an appeal to the High Court. (69-70)
February 2007. Ikatan Ahli Geologi Indonesia (IAGI, Alliance of Indonesia Geologists) organized an international geological workshop on the Sidoarjo mud volcano. It failed to produce concrete recommendations on measures to be taken in response to the mudflow problem.(70)
Other groups that have responded to the disaster and its victims include K2L (Tim Konsultasi Korban Lumpu Sidoarjo, Sidoarjo Mud Victims Consultation Team), Forum Peduli Musibah Lumpur Panas Porong (Porong Hot Mud Forum of Concerned People), and Tim Relawan Porong (Porong Volunteers Team). (70)
The efforts of all of these organizations are largely uncoordinated, and their mission as reported in the media are so wide-ranging that they tend to be unfocused. … One significant consequence of these uncoordinated and, in many cases, compromised relief efforts is that the health and social problems suffered by victims of the mudflow are not being addressed effectively. (70-1)
