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Letter: Tigers kill illegal loggers
A few months ago, residents living in a military housing complex in Jakarta vented their anger by staging violent demonstrations to defy the military order for them to leave their houses empty
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few months ago, residents living in a military housing complex in Jakarta vented their anger by staging violent demonstrations to defy the military order for them to leave their houses empty. They stood up against the order because they said they have lived in the complex for several years.
Recently, as reported, tigers killed an illegal logger in front of his hut in a national park in Jambi, Sumatra, and dozens have fallen victims so far to the animals including angry elephants that had destroyed their properties.
Those two events illustrate similar understanding that even animals, especially wild and strong ones like tigers and elephants, have the guts to vent their anger at human beings who have destroyed their habitat as their means of survival.
These sort of things will keep happening, and the intensity will get be higher as long as illegal logging practices are not stopped.
But when? These practices have been going on for decades, not to mention during President SBY’s first and now entering the sixth month of his second term in office.
The rate of forest destruction in this country is the highest in the world, and is really alarming. In Kalimantan, 1.3 million hectares are lost every year, or 148 hectares per hour, or 2.5 hectares per minute. Meanwhile in Riau, Sumatra, as a result of unchecked illegal logging, the government is losing Rp 15 trillion a month (The Jakarta Post, July 7, 2004) which means Rp 180 trillion (US$2.1 billion) a year, or roughly 10 times the country’s annual debt to the CGI.
Bearing in mind the scale of the forest destruction as mentioned above, only less than one month after his first term in office, SBY declared a war on illegal logging on Nov. 11, 2004, in Pangkalan Bun, Central Kalimantan, vowing to crack down on illegal loggers, including corrupt officials, as one of his priorities during his first 100 days in office.
The intended results of SBY’s war on illegal logging can be seen in a number of cases including in Jambi in which tigers killed an illegal logger in front of his hut, which means these animals were really angry because their means of survival had been significantly reduced day by day.
M. Rusdi
Jakarta
