Courtesy of Bianpoen family
Conscience is where God dwells, so say some theists, and struggling to present God in this country seemingly turning into a “graveyard of ethical values” may be despairing.
In this time of hopelessness and helplessness - demonstrated especially by the behavior of politicians, the elite and public servants, personalities such as Bianpoen, an expert on urban management, can be a source of inspiration and ignite courage in those who want to live a life guided by an inner voice; as his 80 years of life have proved it is still possible to live up to the godly voice in this country.
During his career as a public servant in the Jakarta administration from 1963 to 1986, “Bianpoen never accepted any kind of material gratitude as long as it was related to bribery. For him, bribery was a form of humiliation to his profession,” said the former head of Jakarta Planning Agency, Wastu Pragantha Zhong.
“He was considered a rigid civil servant for being a man of principle,” said his closest friend, senior architect Han Awal.
“My husband even forbade me to drive his official state car,” recalled wife Carla, arts writer and editor.
The bearer of Diplom-Ingenieur, a master’s degree in architecture from the University of Technology Hanover, Germany, returned to Indonesia in 1961 to start his career at West Java’s Bandung Institute of Technology (1962-1963) as a lecturer, before becoming an expert working for the Jakarta Planning Agency between 1963 and 1974.
Bianpoen could have enjoyed material luxuries being a civil servant at the planning agency, a place renowned for easy money flowing at the expense of city spatial planning.
But there was no trace of luxury at his 50-square-meter house at Pejompongan, Central Jakarta.“This house is like a gudang [warehouse],” Carla said, pointing to an old roof and modest living room filled with piles of books.
Between 1979 and 1986, Bianpoen led the city’s urban and environmental center, where building permits and spatial zonings were discussed. It was at this point that “he was regarded as rigid. Of course corrupt officials did not like him,” Carla said.
The father of two said that as a civil servant, he did not serve the government but the truth, “At that time, Jakarta governors were accommodating [toward his principles].” Bianpoen recalled most breaches in city planning during the administration of the first governor of Jakarta, Soemarno, later on Henk Ngantung, Ali Sadikin and Tjokro Pranolo resulted from subordinates twisting the truth.
“But that year, urban development had not been so expansive.”
When he returned from Erasmus University in Rotterdam in 1983, where he was pursuing further postgraduate studies focusing on Jakarta’s urban management, Bianpoen faced the bitter reality that his boss, then Governor R. Soeprapto (1982–1987), had no clue about urban development, therefore undermined the importance of (urban studies’) research. Bianpoen resigned and the governor dissolved the urban and environmental center set up by legendary Governor Ali Sadikin (1966-1977).
Bianpoen then retreated into academia where he could pass on his passion for the ecological paradigm of development to youths, while witnessing the city of Jakarta expand following inadequate urban planning policies: the entire coastline of the city, from the West in Pantai Indah Kapuk to the East in Marunda, is now full of buildings and structures.
Buildings have now taken over marshlands and lowlands, like in Kelapa Gading, North Jakarta. Jakarta Bay, which was initially covered in mangrove forests edged by rock ridges (reefs), is now being reclaimed for development.
“Coastlines mangrove forests, reefs, wetlands, marshes, swamps, and tropical forests constitute the most productive places. Never use these places for development projects of any kind,” stated Bianpoen in his speech during his 80th birthday celebration last month, quoting noted ecologist Odum.
The government has allowed the destruction of natural resources, both land and sea, by permitting construction on marshes, swamps and wetlands, he said.
What is most saddening, Bianpoen went on, is that even though construction projects will clearly damage the environment and are in contravention of existing spatial planning (RTRW), the RTRW itself has been revised and modified to suit the needs of developers.
When addressing his close friends and students who attended his cozy birthday gathering at Han Awal’s chic office compound in South Jakarta, he said: “If [natural] destruction should occur due to the actions of architects, then those architects could be said to have broken the moral and ethical code of the profession.”
In his opinion, one of the basic problems in the architectural educations is that curriculums are too focused on technical and artistic aspects, “The social and environmental dimension are only touched on in passing.
“Physical development will always exist as long as humans are around,” commented his friend, sociologist Melly G. Tan, at the birthday party, “and development will always entail natural destruction”.
Bianpoen emphasized the importance of techniques of development with minimum destruction, such as absorption wells to substitute natural water catchments. “We should first scrutinize our development plan and think about techniques to eradicate destruction.”
When technology does not provide answers to sustain nature, “Then we should make sure we use natural resources wisely, because technology can only substitute a minor percentage of natural destruction caused by development.”
Born as Liem Bian Poen in 1930 in Mojokerto, East Java, his present name reflects the racism that prevailed under the New Order government of President Soeharto (1967-1998) “I was forced to change my Chinese name into something more ‘Indonesian’.” Bianpoen admitted that he “hadn’t thought much about the issue; thus I gave up my family name ‘Liem’ through a legal process, kept the surname and changed it to ‘Bianpoen’.”
He admitted that he had distanced himself from the tiring polemics of Chinese identity and the debate between the virtues of assimilation versus integration, although he was once the leader of an ethnic-base Indonesian student movement in Delft, The Netherlands, called Tionghoa Chin Hui.
Bianpoen and Carla married in 1960 in Munster, Germany, and did not adopt the Indonesian middleclass custom of hiring a domestic helper at home. “The secret of my healthy old-age? Well, it lies in doing my household work and keeping my mind busy discussing issues,” said Bianpoen.
Being 80 years old doesn’t stop Bianpoen from regularly cleaning the roof of his house, cut overhanging branches, and teaching graduate and postgraduate programs in Environmental Science at the University of Indonesia.
“Indonesians are not trained to be critical, so it is challenging to stir discussion in classes,” he said with regards to teaching at the Pelita Harapan University’s department of Architecture, a campus of upperclass students, especially given Bianpoen’s “preferential option for the poor” mindset.
“In classrooms I continue to voice the perspective of the marginalized; I don’t know whether [privileged UPH students] agree with my standpoint.
“But, they prepared a nice birthday cake [last month]. It proves that they do not dislike me.”
