Pustaka Ilmiah Universitas Padjadjaran

Abstrak

Planning resettlement programs

Resettlement programs must be carefully designed and implemented so as to be an opportunity for people to become better-off, but there have been many cases where this was not so. Even if the program was carefully prepared, the full consequences of resettlement may not be as expected. In this chapter, we review six cases of dam resettlement programs: three in Japan two in Indonesia, and one in Lao People’s Democratic Republic (PDR). First, we present two cases of land-for-land compensation: the Wawa Dam in Japan and Nam Ngum 1 Dam in Lao PDR. The former was constructed half a century ago, before the Japanese government adopted a cash compensation policy. The latter was constructed in 1971 during the county’s civil war. The Lao project neither involved resettlers in project planning nor development of a resettlement program. Then, we present the two cases of Wonorejo and Saguling in Indonesia, where compensation included cash and participation in the Transmigration Program (TP), which was introduced to facilitate immigration from the densely populated islands of Java and Bali to less populated ones such as Sumatra and Sulawesi. In both cases, the majority of resettlers chose to move to areas near the reservoir, while the government had assumed that many people w ould choose to move to more remote areas, including other islands. As a result, the natural resources in the resettlement area became insufficient to improve the lives of resettlers. Finally, we present two Japanese cases in which resettlers were relatively satisfied with resettlement. In the Kusaki Dam case, where compensation was principally made by cash, resettlers were able to negotiate with the developer in order to continue their jobs after resettlement. In the case of the Jintsugawa Dams, a unique rent scheme was employed for the resettlers to maintain their livelihoods and their pride as landowners.