At least five people were killed and 1,300 others rushed to shelters as floods submerged neighborhoods in Jakarta over the weekend. Jakarta Governor Anies Baswedan said the fl ow of water from Bogor and Depok in West Java had prolonged the fl oodwaters’ receding time, which was initially estimated to take only six hours after the rain stopped.

While Depok acting mayor Sri Utomo said Anies’ statement was “fair” considering the topography, Bogor Mayor Bima Arya Sugiarto was not convinced because the water level at the Katulampa sluice gate in Bogor had not experienced a significant increase. Despite the flow of water, the recurrence of floods has shown the failure of the current administration to improve the city’s poor water channels, said urban planning expert Nirwono Joga.

“It shows the governor has not done his job to restore the rivers, whose carrying capacity is inadequate. This was exacerbated by the poor drainage system, so the fl oods struck several roads and underpasses.” Nirwono said on Monday.

He called on Jakarta to carry out thorough and integrated waterway rehabilitation and immediately open up river banks through “normalization” and “naturalization” — two similar approaches that differ mainly in the materials used to build embankments. Under the normalization program, which was introduced by President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo during his time as Jakarta governor, concrete piling was installed along the river.

Anies added the naturalization program to replace concrete piling with river stones and transform riverbanks into green public spaces. Anies plans to eliminate the river-normalization program from the 2017-2022 Regional Medium-Term Development Plan (RPJMD) as part of flood management and to simply rely on his river-naturalization program.

In the draft revision of the RPJMD, the river normalization program has been removed from a chapter that previously listed both normalization and naturalization projects as part of the Jakarta flood control program in 13 rivers crossing the city.

This has attracted criticism from the Indonesian Solidarity Party (PSI), which also linked the recent floods to the city’s poor river-restoration program, while pointing to “the governor’s failure to set work priorities and a budget”.

City councillor Justin Adrian Untayana of the PSI said Anies had not completed any normalization or naturalization projects after more than three years in offi ce because his administration had been slow in land acquisition.

A volunteer evacuates residents affected by the flood in Petogogan, South Jakarta on Feb. 20. Heavy rain in the past few days caused several parts of Jakarta and its surrounding areas to be inundated by floodwater. (Antara/M. Risyal Hidayat)

Jakarta claims to have naturalized the West Flood Canal in the Shangri La-Karet segment, which Justin said was more of a “beautification” because there had been no widening of the river. “I can’t imagine what would happen if the normalization program was completely abolished. Even while it is listed, the work has been nonexistent,” Justin said.

He regretted that despite the sluggish work, Jakarta Deputy Governor Ahmad Riza Patria was “too fast to claim victory” when the latter recently said that flood management under Anies’ leadership was better than the previous administrations.

While the restoration work for rivers running through some provinces is shared among Jakarta, its neighbors and the Public Works and Housing Ministry, the Jakarta administration has responsibility for opening up the riverbanks populated by residents within its jurisdiction.

However, the PSI said Anies appeared to be subordinating the urgent need for land acquisition. City councillor Anggara Wicitra Sastroamidjojo said Anies had insisted on allocating Rp 560 billion (US$39 million) for the “commitment fee” for hosting the Formula E electric motorsports championship in 2022, but failed to pay Rp 160 billion for the land acquisition for flood prevention.

Jakarta councillor Gilbert Simanjuntak of the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P) said that under the previous administration, Jakarta had normalized at least 16 out of 33 kilometers of the targeted segments of the Ciliwung River, but the naturalization program was still “a concept on paper”.

He compared Anies with former governor Basuki “Ahok” Tjahaja Purnama, who managed to undertake river-restoration efforts with a regional budget of Rp 55 trillion. “COVID-19 shouldn’t be a problem for 2021 because they have a budget of Rp 87 trillion.”

Jakarta has denied the full removal of the river-normalization program from the RPJMD planned revision. In a release on Feb. 10, Jakarta Development Planning Board (Bappeda) head Nasruddin Djoko Surjono said that river-normalization activities were still listed in another chapter of the RPJMD draft.

He said the city had carried out land acquisition along the Ciliwung, Pesanggrahan, Sunter and Jatikramat rivers in 2020, costing around Rp 340 billion, and had budgeted Rp 1.07 trillion for land acquisition and development of several reservoirs in 2021.

The PSI said the term “normalization” was indeed found in that particular part of the RPJMD in two contexts, one of which was the national strategic activities. Questions remain, however, as to how Jakarta will translate it into a regional activity. The other context is environmental protection under the control of the Jakarta Environmental Agency, which the PSI said was diff erent from the context of flood prevention