According to The United States Environmental Protection Agency, environmental justice is defined as the fair treatment and meaningful involvement of all people regardless of race, color, national origin, or income with respect to the development, implementation, and enforcement of environmental laws, regulations, and policies.  Environmental justice includes three aspects as follows :

 

1.  Aspect of procedural democracy : maintaining all parties (society) in the true meaning.

2.  Aspect of substantive justice : the right to live and enjoy a healthy and clean environment.

3. Aspect of distributive justice : a prevalent distribution of the benefits gained from the environment.

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The concept of environmental justice began as a movement in the 1980s due to the realization of a disproportionate number of polluting industries, power plants, and waste disposal areas were located near low-income or minority communities. The movement was set in place to ensure fair distribution of environmental burdens among all people regardless of their background. In short, environmental justice is defined as a movement in the grassroots that strives for equal treatment for the people regardless of ethnic, cultural, socio-economic, in terms of development, implementation and enforcement of laws, regulations and policies. Fair treatment means that no individual or group may be more disadvantaged by environmental impacts.

 

The environmental justice movement became stronger as the world community recognized the right of a healthy environment as part of human rights agreed at the 1993 Vienna Convention together with the right of development. In Indonesia, the right of environment has been adopted in various statutory provisions, both post-amendment state and state constitutions. In the 1945 Constitution of the Second Amendment, Article 28H Paragraph (1) states: "Every person shall have the right to live in physical and spiritual prosperity, to live and to obtain a good and healthy environment, to be entitled to health services". Also, Articles 5 and 8 of Law No. 23 Year 1997 on Environmental Management and Article 3 of Law No. 39 Year 1999 on Human Rights state: "Everyone has equal rights over a good and healthy environment".

 

There are many cases from around the world about people being treated unfairly as a result of environmental cases, as well as cases that community groups are trying to protect and defend their rights of health and environmental justice. One of the biggest environmental cases in Indonesia is the Lapindo Mudflow case in Sidoarjo, Indonesia. Lapindo mudflow is the most controversial ecological case in Indonesia. Due to the negligence of oil and gas company, PT Lapindo Brantas Inc., hot mud burst from Banjar Panji-1 well in Renokenongo village, Porong sub-district, Sidoarjo - East Java on May 29, 2006. Since then, the mudflow have reached 150.000 m3 every day. Three years later, the widespread mudflow have not been successfully stopped and the victims who used to live in the 15 villages around the well were still fighting for their rights, demanding Lapindo's responsibility, government protection, and justice.

 

There was controversy as to what triggered the eruption and whether the event was a natural disaster or not. According to PT Lapindo Brantas Inc., it was the 2006 Yogyakarta earthquake that triggered the mud flow eruption, and not their drilling activities. Two days before the mud eruption, an earthquake of moment magnitude 6.3 hit the south coast of Central Java and Yogyakarta provinces killing 6,234 people and leaving 1.5 million homeless. So, eventually, The Supreme Court (MA) declared Lapindo mudflow case as the impact of natural disaster, so none of the corporation of PT Lapindo Brantas Inc. or the government have been exposed to the law due to this case. The Supreme Court assessed that the government has issued the necessary policy to handle the mudflow that occurred since May 2006 by forming an integrated team of mud mitigation. While PT Lapindo Brantas Inc. considered to have spent a lot of money for the refugees and to handle the mudflow and to pay the cost of allotments for the refugees. In addition, refugees have also been evacuated to Porong Market with the transportation provided by Lapindo. Lapindo has also paid the cost of contracting the homes of the refugees and taking care of the school fees of the children of the victims. A similar opinion was also held by the House of Representatives of the Republic of Indonesia. The House of Representatives plenary session confirmed the cause of the Lapindo spurt was a factor of natural disasters. Thus, no single individual or institution in Lapindo can be criminalized.

 

The verdict was very disappointing to the residents. They deeply regretted the indecency of the government's attitude as Lapindo's case has even been 12 years old today. The government was considered not serious in handling this case. The residents were the most disadvantaged victims. Environmental damage was accompanied by social, economic, health, and cultural impacts deeply felt by them. In addition to the rising unemployment rate due to job losses, this hot mud has also paralyzed Gempol - Surabaya toll road transportation which resulted in losses for the transportation services companies and other economic. They lost their homes, properties, resources, livelihoods, and socio-cultural relationships. They were also exposed to increased health risks arising from exposure to heavy metals such as arsenic, cadmium, chromium and mercury as well as Polycyclic Aromatic Hydrocarbons (PAH) and Hydrogen Sulfide (H2S) organic compounds. Chronic exposure could lead to cancer and other diseases, especially respiratory diseases.

 

The victims of Lapindo have repeatedly demonstrated in Surabaya and Jakarta demanding that Lapindo and the government at least should immediately pay the compensation at that time. Compensation to the victims has been calculated by the government with a total value of Rp 3.8 trillion, which is based on the map of the area affected by the mudflow. Of the total value, PT Minarak Lapindo Jaya (a subsidiary of PT Lapindo Brantas Inc.) was only able to pay Rp 3.03 trillion. The difference was assisted by the government with a final value of Rp 827 billion (Lapindo must pay this bailout to the government). Almost all of compensation has been paid to the victims, but there are some who claimed that they only received a portion of the promised and agreed compensation. Now, it has been 12 years of Lapindo mudflow, the areas around the mud have now started to improve and have become a tourist spot, but of course, the government still has to pay attention to the psychological condition and social structure of the victims, especially about their environment and health that must be recovered.

 

Sources :

https://jaobima.or.id/environmental-justice-keadilan-lingkungan-dan-ekologi/

https://study.com/academy/lesson/what-is-environmental-justice-definition-principles-examples-issues.html

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sidoarjo_mud_flow

https://nasional.kontan.co.id/news/sengkarut-dana-ganti-rugi-lumpur-lapindo

 

Images  :

By Hugh e82 - Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0,

(https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=7842850)

 

P.s Sorry for the late report because I've been busy doing my stuffs in the last 2 weeks.