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Activists want military to stay out of evictions
Jakarta Post - May 4, 2016
The Jakarta Legal Aid Institute (LBH Jakarta), which recorded military involvement in 65 out of the 113 evictions carried out by the administration in 2015, believes the number remains high this year.
"It's a violation of law when the military takes part in a civilian eviction, yet it keep happening almost every time," LBH Jakarta lawyer Alldo Fellix Januardy said, referring to the Social Conflict Law and its associated government regulation.
Article 33 of Law No. 7/2012 on social conflict stipulates that the governor could asked for military assistance during a national-scale conflict and should be carried out in accordance to government regulation.
Meanwhile, according to Article 40 on Government Regulation No. 2/2015 on implementing regulation of the Social Conflict Law, the regional administration or central government must declare a state of conflict before military personnel can be deployed to handle or mitigate a conflict situation.
Furthermore, Article 43 of the regulation defines a state of conflict as a situation where the police is unable to handle and that it possesses a threat to the system of governance.
"Forced evictions are not categorized as a social conflict as regulated in the law," Alldo said. "The main duty of military forces is to safeguard state sovereignty, not evict civilians."
LBH Jakarta also recorded that from 113 forced-eviction cases, in 95 eviction cases, the city administration did not initiate dialogue with residents, while in 72 cases, the city did not offer fair compensation to evicted residents.
Jakarta Governor Basuki "Ahok" Tjahaja Purnama has often asked for military and police personnel to support the eviction of civilians he considered illegal occupants of government land. While many have criticized military involvement, Ahok insists he needs police and military forces to handle violent evictees.
In February, Ahok said military officers were deployed at the scene of evictions to make sure procedures are carried smoothly. "I have heard the complaints ever since the Waduk Pluit eviction [in 2013]," he said, playing down the criticism.
Purportedly a thousand-plus police and military officers have answered the governor's call by taking part in recent evictions including in August 2015 when a clash broke out during the eviction of 3,400 residents from Kampung Pulo, East Jakarta.
Gugun Muhammad of the Urban Poor Consortium (UPC) said the policy to involve soldiers in evicting civilians was similar with the actions applied during the New-Order era under the Soeharto dictatorship, in which the military engaged in many aspects of civilian life.
"The public haven't completely forgotten the bad image our military forces had during the New Order era, where their involvement in the recent forced evictions does not help at all," Gugun said.
The National Commission on Human Rights (Komnas HAM) have also criticized the Jakarta Administration's move to utilize military forces in eviction processes, as it emphasized dialogue and other more humane approaches be prioritized rather than brute force.
Komnas HAM's Hafidz Abbas said recently that it showed the "arrogance" of the city administration, as military officers were also deployed to place pressure on residents who refused to be evicted.
Source: http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2016/05/04/activists-want-military-stay-out-evictions.html.
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