T

he involvement of police and Indonesian Military (TNI) officers has exacerbated thousands of land conflicts in regions across the country, the National Commission on Human Rights (Komnas HAM) has said.

The commission has recorded around 9,000 land conflicts, mostly involving business interests, with corporations often using police and TNI officers to enforce confiscation of land from residents.

'€œAs many as 74 percent of cases are caused by the same businesspeople. In other words, there'€™s a land monopoly going on,'€ Komnas HAM commissioner Hafid Abbas told The Jakarta Post.

'€œThere'€™s an intimate relationship between regional governments and businesspeople. Before elections, potential leaders approach businesspeople for campaign capital. Once elected, they award the land in return, no matter what the original use of the land,'€ Hafid explained.

He added that since the fall of president Soeharto, the TNI, notorious for human rights abuses under the dictatorship, had been involved in fewer cases, with police officers instead increasingly implicated.

The police, along with local administrations and businesspeople, were, he said, usually responsible for violence in land conflicts.

'€œTo protect businesspeople, local administrations use the police,'€ he said.

Meanwhile, House of Representatives Commission II overseeing home affairs has demanded that the Agrarian and Spatial Planning Ministry disclose land conflicts in which police and TNI officers are involved.

National Mandate Party (PAN) lawmaker Amran revealed a land dispute involving police officers during a hearing with the National Land Agency (BPN) on Monday.

'€œOn May 27, the police deployed 700 personnel to evict only six houses in Cipinang, East Jakarta. The residents had been there a long time. They bought the land, it wasn'€™t given. There are two certificates claiming ownership of the land. The first one is dated July 29, 2004, while the second claims that the police have owned the land since July 24, 2007. I'€™ve checked with the Finance Ministry and found that it'€™s not a police asset. I asked [the BPN] to award ownership rights to the residents, but the agency refused, apparently by order of the police,'€ Amran said.

According to media reports, the evictions took place when the case was still ongoing at the East Jakarta District Court.

The Agrarian and Spatial Planning Ministry has admitted that many land conflicts are unresolved, with only 261 of 4,199 cases this year resolved as of August.

Acting ministry secretary-general Heri Santoso said that the low number of resolutions was down to an internal ministry restructuring.

'€œThe budget for spatial planning and control is Rp 1 trillion [US$69 million] but we couldn'€™t use it before August because it was moved from the Public Works and Public Housing Ministry to our ministry in this year'€™s revised budget. Without the internal restructuring, the government usually solves 50 percent of cases annually,'€ he told the Post.

Heri added that the ministry had limited authority in resolving disputes, as it was only in charge of land administration, such as issuing certificates and documents.

Authority over land use, he said, was in the hands of local administrations. (rbk)
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