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Sidoarjo, East Java. With sadness and increasing despair, former residents of dozens of villages engulfed by mud will today mark the date three years ago that sludge began gushing out of a crack in the earth near an oil and gas drilling well in East Java.

Thousands of hectares of industrial and agricultural land, as well as settlements in this densely populated district, have been inundated by an ever-gushing mud volcano that has come to be known as the Lapindo mudflow.

While more than 15,000 residents were left homeless as a result, the company whose name and reputation is tied to the mudflow, PT Lapindo Brantas, which is controlled by the Bakrie group, is yet to finish compensating victims for the loss of their land and homes.
Their suffering is likely to be turned into a political issue as the presidential election approaches, political analyst Fadjroel Rachman said, adding that candidates would certainly court mudflow victims.

Meanwhile, victims like Iva Hasanah, whose home in a housing complex in Renokenongo was destroyed by the mud, continue to wait for help. “We are going to hold a joint prayer session on the [mudflow] embankment [this evening],” Iva said.

Not one of the 13 people — mostly drilling firm executives — named as suspects in the police’s investigation into the incident has been brought to court.

“We have already submitted our case files to the East Java Prosecutor’s Office, but they have always returned the documents demanding that they be corrected and completed,” said Pudji Astuti, a spokeswoman for the East Java Police.

“Police have not yet concluded that the investigation will be stopped,” she added.

A last-ditch appeal by the Foundation of the Indonesian Legal Aid Institute (YLBHI) to get the case heard was rejected by the Supreme Court in April. Lower courts had rejected the YLBHI’s suit against the government and Lapindo accusing them of failing in their obligations to the victims.

The government has ordered that Lapindo, which has been accused of causing the mudflow through negligence in the drilling process, compensate victims for damages. Lapindo maintains the mudflow is a natural phenomenon triggered by an earthquake in Yogyakarta a few days before the mud began gushing from the ground.

The global financial crisis has caused a whole new set of problems. Many victims are yet to receive the 20 percent advance on their property’s value promised to them.

The Bakrie group subsidiary given the responsibility of handing out compensation said in February that as a result of the crisis it could only afford to pay the balance to victims in monthly Rp 15 million ($1,455) installments.

All compensation will be paid out by 2010, said Yuniwati Teryana, a company spokeswoman.

As the presidential election approaches, Taufik Basari, the founder of Community Legal Aid Agency, called on voters to take into consideration the way the candidates have dealt with victims of the mudflow.

Siti Maimunah of the Mining Advocacy Network said the mudflow issue should be included in the presidential debates.