If you are planning for one year, plant rice
If you are planning for twenty years, plant trees
If you are planning for one hundred years, plant people.” – Chinese proverb
It has been reported that the Tanjung Priok district administration is planning to evict 1,200 families from Kampung Bayam where the people had occupied the land since 1990. It was then a tract of land with a thick undergrowth, and which was cleared by the people and then cultivated. In fact, the name Kampung Bayam literally means Spinach Kampung. Residents claim there has never been any objection to the occupation and cultivation of the land.
It appears that the district administration has conspired to increase the green area in the city. Besides, there have been complaints that the floods experienced the last year in the city were largely due to the occupation and the cultivation of the area. Whatever be the reasons for the planned eviction, the fact remains that most of the persons of the informal sector dwelt in their own houses or in rented houses and earned their living.
The Chinese proverb has it that if we are planning for hundred years, we need to plant people. The administration of Tanjung Priok has apparently got their priorities wrong. What comes first – grass, trees or people? This is in no way meant to undermine the need for greenery or the trees that could, in addition to the beautification, contribute to the generation of oxygen by removing pollutants.
There is a growing concern regarding the quality of air in the city, given the ever increasing vehicular traffic and the unclean streets. But at what expense? The Sabbath day is made for man and not man for the Sabbath. Beautification and clean air is for people and not vice versa. We are not against the beautification of persons, though. Has the administration really exhausted other alternatives before deciding on the eviction of people? The apparently hasty decision would adversely affect anything like five thousand persons. Is there a definite road map as to where these displaced persons would ultimately settle down?
We are given to understand that the administration has proposed an alternate settlement for the displaced families. While the residents have expressed their willingness to be relocated elsewhere, they are reticent about a number of matters that need to be considered. Since the majority depends on the city for their livelihood, these workers of the informal sector need to be in the vicinity of the city.
Besides, access to services like education of the children, health facilities particularly for children and mothers, transportation, water and electricity are essentials which cannot be ignored. The residents of Bayam had developed their own system of living that included survival techniques, which obviously cannot be replicated, but at least the essentials need to be guaranteed.
The most important component would be the question of housing. These persons over the years have been able to making a living abode called a home which may appear rudimentary by most of the standards. What guarantee is there that they would be assisted by the state or the local administration, even by way of easily payable loans for their housing? What about their entitlement to basic amenities like water, electricity, schooling, health, transport and other essentials?
What we at the Asian Human Rights Commission would like to insist is that people come first and not trees. If trees have to be planted, they should not be at the expense of the people. All persons have the right to benefit from green areas, not just the elite. If at all people have to be evicted, it should be for resettlement. Such resettlement presupposes the consent of the beneficiaries and an assurance of the provision of all the amenities enjoyed by them prior to the resettlement. Indonesia, a signatory to the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights has an obligation to ensure that all sections of society enjoy a life that respects their dignity as human persons.
