Abdul Khalik and Desy Nurhayati, Jakarta – Members of the House of Representatives say they have no plans to push for immediate measures to help 12,000 families in Sidoarjo, East Java, who were displaced two years ago by a mudflow.
The lawmakers said Thursday a House team had been monitoring the issue and they were waiting for the team's report.
"We have no plans to hold a hearing with the team right now," Andreas Pareira of the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P) told The Jakarta Post.
Harry Azhar Azis of the Golkar Party was indifferent to the issue, and said his party had nothing to offer the victims to cope with the mudflow, which has inundated four villages and badly affected 11 others.
PDI-P and Golkar are the two biggest House factions, controlling a total of 244 out of 550 seats.
Amid waning political and public support, thousands of victims of the disaster marked the second anniversary of the mudflow with a mass prayer. A planned protest was canceled at the request of the police.
Those affected by the mudflow include 20 police officers who were posted in the villages. They complained of respiratory problems following prolonged exposure to high levels of methane gas emitted from the ground, as well as severely polluted air.
The Prosperous Justice Party's Wahyudin Munawir, a member of House Commission VII on mining, criticized the monitoring team for its lack of ideas on how the government should resolve the disaster.
"We're using the second anniversary of the Lapindo-caused mudflow as momentum to urge the government to be serious in helping and compensating victims fairly," he said.
"The monitoring team has absolutely nothing helpful to say, and other House members have seemingly forgotten about the tragedy already."
The National Commission on Human Rights said Wednesday the state had committed a serious human rights violation in continuing to neglect the rights of the mudflow victims.
Political expert Indra J. Pilliang, from the Centre for Strategic and International Studies, said he was worried the House's silence on the matter was intentional. He said it was possible the issue would only be brought to the forefront during the 2009 general election.
The government said Thursday it had urged PT Minarak Lapindo Jaya, which operated the well from which the hot mud started spewing, to expedite compensation for the victims.
Presidential spokesman Andi Mallarangeng said the company had started distributing the second part of the compensation package.
"We will continue urging the company to pay the full compensation immediately and fairly, so that the victims' rights are upheld," he said.
As of Wednesday, the company has paid 11 families whose lands were lost to the mud the remaining 80 percent of compensation, following an initial payment of 20 percent. The company says it will take until November to complete all payments.
Andi Darussalam Tabusalla, Lapindo vice president, said his company had offered the victims new homes if they had valid documents for the homes they had lost.
Those without valid property documents were offered empty land instead. They were given the option of selling this land to developer PT Wahana Arta Raya.
Mudflow victims who accepted the compensation have been given 1,067 plots of land at the Kahuripan Nirwana village housing complex, which, like Lapindo, belongs to the Bakrie family.
[Indra Harsaputra contributed to this article from Sidoarjo.]