S

tudents of SMP 289 public junior high school have been blocked off from entering school because the city administration is in the mid of a land dispute, this time with a community unit (RW) leader in North Jakarta.

Gubar, the leader of RW 5 Cilincing in North Jakarta, has demanded the city administration compensate him as he used the school'€™s land from 1987 until 2009, at which point the city started the construction of the school.

He demanded the city administration pay up to Rp 2.25 billion (US$225,972), or 25 percent of the 2.8-hectare land value, and blocked the only access to the school until the city granted his demand.

Gubar insisted he had the rights to the land, however, he failed to provide supporting evidence, detik.com reported.

Governor Joko '€œJokowi'€ Widodo said on Tuesday that the city administration would ignore Gubar'€™s demand, saying the land belonged to the city.

'€œThe land is obviously owned by the city administration,'€ Jokowi told reporters at City Hall.

Jokowi lamented the dispute, which he said dated back to the previous administration.

'€œHe'€™s demanding compensation because apparently someone promised him that, so now I have to clean up the mess,'€ he said.

The governor pointed out that the city administration would build a new access route to the school.

'€œSome nice residents have been willing to allow us open a new access route on their land. We will only have to flatten the area '€” it can be done within one or two days,'€ he said.

Jakarta Education Agency head Taufik Yudi Mulyanto said the city administration built the school based on request of local residents because the area did not have a public junior high school.

According to the agency, the school had nine classrooms with each room having a capacity of 32 students.

'€œWe have received 298 students for the 2013/2014 school year,'€ he said.

In 2009, Gubar demanded the Jakarta Education Agency compensate him for '€œwatching over, maintaining and utilizing the 2.8-hectare plot of land in Sukapura, Cilincing, North Jakarta'€. Gubar claimed he had a letter from then Sukapura subdistrict leader Ade Himawan, authorizing him to be responsible for the land.

Jakarta has seen many land disputes with various modus operandi, resulting in hindered developments.

In many cases, opportunists built houses or buildings on idle land owned by the city administration, in the hopes that the city administration would compensate them once it took over the land for city projects.

The 1960 Agrarian Law allows residents to use idle land owned by the government, however, the government has the right to take over the land to use it at any time.