JAKARTA – Seven residents from Indonesia’s flood-ravaged Sumatra region took legal action Thursday against their government, filing a lawsuit that demands national disaster designation for three provinces still struggling with recovery efforts.
The legal documents were submitted to Indonesia’s state administrative court on Thursday, targeting the country’s president, environment minister, forestry minister, agriculture minister, and the director of the national disaster mitigation agency, according to petitioner Diki Rafiqi.
The lawsuit centers on the government’s failure to declare national disaster status for Aceh, North Sumatra, and West Sumatra provinces, where reconstruction work has ground to a halt due to insufficient provincial funding.
“Many residents still do not have temporary houses … This is the most basic thing and it’s due to the local government’s limited financial capacity,” Rafiqi explained to Reuters.
Under Indonesian law, national disaster designation would require the central government to allocate federal funds for rebuilding efforts, including temporary shelters and permanent housing for displaced families.
The petitioners are also seeking an immediate halt to new permits for forest use, mining operations, and plantation development until environmental restoration is complete across the three provinces. Additionally, they want existing permits in these industries reviewed and potentially revoked.
The devastating floods and landslides, triggered by cyclonic storms last year, claimed at least 1,200 lives and destroyed or damaged approximately 300,000 homes throughout the region.
Environmental organizations have pointed to widespread deforestation across Sumatra as a contributing factor that worsened the natural disaster’s impact on local communities.
