Venidora Oliveira – Communities are continuing to build houses on protected land, even though it has been banned by the government.
National MP Fernanda Lay said the fourth constitutional government had already identified environmentally sensitive land for protection and asked communities not to build homes in these areas.
"In Tasitolu and Areia Branca people are continuing to build their house on the [protected] areas and the government should control it," said Lay. She said that unless the government enforced the law better communities would continue to build homes and it would cost the government a lot of money.
Under Timorese law, the government is obligated to pay compensation to communities to cover relocation costs, even if the homes were built illegally. "In the future we will spend a lot of money for that because it is not easy to ask communities to leave," said Lay.
Based on her personal observations, she said the law was not being implemented effectively and government controls were weak. "So far the government is not serious about taking action," she said.
In response to the issue, Minister for Strategic Planning and Investment Xanana Gusmao acknowledged that the government was to blame for the lack of proper controls. "I must agree that this is our mistake," he said.
He said one of the problems was that there was a lack of coordination between the government and the xefe sukus (village chiefs) about how to protect sensitive land.
"We don't have good controls," he said. However, he promised to resolve the issue, so that the government would not have to pay a large amount of compensation in the future.