Destinations knownWelcome to Indonesia’s ‘new Bali’ – site of alleged human rights abuses
- A United Nations rapporteur has called out businesses for involvement in a tourism development on Lombok for which he says villagers were forcibly evicted
- Local authorities and police denied to the BBC there had been any land grabs, and multilateral development bank finds no evidence of ‘alleged coercion’
Think of Bali and a motorcycle grand prix probably isn’t the first thing that springs to mind. But a circuit for such races is under construction in Mandalika, a coastal resort area on the neighbouring island of Lombok, one of 10 “new Balis” designated by Indonesian President Joko Widodo.
Designed to replicate the international appeal and associated financial success – at least before Covid-19 exposed the weaknesses of a visitor-dependent economy – of Indonesia’s biggest tourism brand, the focus of the “new Balis” project has been narrowed to five destinations, at a cost of 4.01 trillion rupiah this year alone, The Jakarta Post reports. Mandalika is among the “super priority” locations – “selected based on their accessibility, their viability as tourism destinations, and the presence of a pre-existing tourism scene to build on”, according to online news publication Insider – being primed to bring in the post-pandemic punters.
However, all this development appears to come at a troubling human cost, with the United Nations having raised the alarm over “aggressive land grabs, forced evictions of Sasak indigenous peoples, and intimidation and threats against human rights defenders” at the Lombok site.
“Farmers and fisher folks have been expelled from their land and have endured the destruction of their houses, fields, water sources, cultural and religious sites, as the Government of Indonesia and the ITDC [Indonesia Tourism Development Corporation] groomed Mandalika to become a ‘New Bali’,” said Olivier De Schutter, the UN special rapporteur on extreme poverty and human rights, in a statement released on March 31.
“Credible sources have found that the local residents were subjected to threats and intimidations and forcibly evicted from their land without compensation. Despite these findings, the ITDC has not sought to pay compensation or settle the land disputes.”