Yuli Tri Suwarni, Bandung – Some 100 students from the Bandung Institute of Technology (ITB) staged a rally Tuesday to protest the swearing-in ceremony of newly elected Mayor Dada Rosada and Vice Mayor Ayi Vivananda.
The students, from the ITB Students' Body (KM-ITB), were protesting the conversion of Babakan Siliwangi forest, in the western part of the ITB campus, into a restaurant and a three-floor parking building.
Staged some 50 meters in front of the Merdeka Building on Jl. Asia-Afrika where the ceremony was held, the students demanded the Bandung municipal administration cancel a cooperation agreement with the project developer.
Students handed out flyers and held a silent protest by symbolically taping their mouths shut with black tape.
West Java Governor Ahmad Heryawan, who officiated at the inauguration ceremony, also asked the new mayor and his deputy to run the administration and development programs based on environmental considerations.
Ahmad said air pollution and a shortage of clean water were Bandung residents' main problems, triggered by environmental degradation and diminishing open green spaces.
"We have to change our development paradigm, which places more importance on the material side without considering effects to the environment," he said during the ceremony.
KM-ITB spokesman Irfani Priananda said the group's protest against the Babakan Siliwangi conversion was staged because the project would damage the environment.
In July, the students conducted a brief investigation on the project. They found there were many springs at the future project site which would cause damage to buildings.
"The springs in Babakan Siliwangi are unique because they produce clean water all year long, even during the dry season," Irfani said.
"The number of springs in the area has decreased from 13 to 7 since ITB built a sports complex and the Sasana Budaya Ganesha convention hall."
The students also reminded the administration the construction of the restaurant and parking building would only worsen groundwater degradation in Bandung, which is subsiding at a rate of 4.2 millimeters per year.
The administration was also urged to increase the number of open green areas, from 7.68 percent of the city's area to 30 percent.
Responding to the protest, Mayor Dada said he would reevaluate the project, handled by PT Esa Gemilang Indah from the Istana Group.
As mayor from 2003 until 2008, Dada signed a memorandum of understanding between the administration and PT Esa Gemilang Indah to redesign and operate Babakan Siliwangi until 2027.
The company will build a restaurant and a 7,000-square-meter art gallery, while the administration will build a three-story parking building.
"We will see whether the project threatens the environment. If so, we will revise the agreement," Dada said.
Dada's tenure has seen many green areas converted into commercial buildings and spaces, giving rise to numerous protests against the mayor.