Vaudine England, Jakarta – For the many thousands of rural Indonesians who have begun reclaiming their land by direct action, the country's new-found enthusiasm for democracy means more than a succession of noisy parades.
From East Kalimantan to Medan to Java and beyond, dispossessed farmers or forest-dwellers are organising themselves against large plantation, logging or industrial companies to protect their rights to land, livelihood and culture.
The latest land conflict to become violent was near Medan, Sumatra. On Tuesday, police opened fire on 5,000 protesters who had converged on the headquarters of state plantation firm PTP II, demanding the return of land they said had been illegally taken.
Earlier this month, in West Java, hundreds of farmers claiming rights to land developed by another state plantation company burned crops, houses and a copra processing plant.
The Legal Aid Institute and the National Commission on Human Rights reported that the reoccupation of land and labour conflicts over rising unemployment were the two issues most regularly complained about.
In each case, the underlying issue was the same: the virtual absence of an inalienable right to the ownership of land.
Around this central problem lies almost every other controversy in the way economic and political power is distributed in Indonesia – corruption and the lack of rule of law, the decentralisation of power from Jakarta to the regions, the uneasy coexistence of different ethnic groups and the fate of the environment.
"People are not opposed to cash crops, but they want their own control," said a foreign forestry specialist in Kalimantan.
People have disappeared or died after pitting themselves against large corporations which are usually protected by the security forces.
No political party contesting the election on June 7 has a detailed programme on land management.
Formally, land rights did exist but "tenure security is very low", said a land expert at the World Bank. Land is divided into two types, "forest" and "non-forest" land, where "forest" land is under the management of the Ministry of Forestry, covering 70 per cent of the country, and is not subject to individual land titles.
The ministry issues concessions in a process at best erratic. "Non-forest" land can be held through individual title, but in practice this is warped by a similar lack of transparency.
Communities can also hold land according to local "adat" law, or people can acquire title by possession. Such deals have been part of history for generations and known to all, but are legal now only if notarised.
"It's a mess. It's open to all sorts of abuse and misuse," said the land expert. "If you own a piece of land, anyone with power or money can leave you with nothing."