Land grabbing, conflict and agrarian‐environmental transformations: perspectives from East and Southeast Asia An international academic conference 5‐6 June 2015, Chiang Mai University Conference Paper No. 46 Legal Pluralism and Land Administration in West Sumatra: The Implementation of Local and Nagari Governments’ Regulations on Communal Land Tenure Hilaire Tegnan May 2015 BICAS www.plaas.org.za/bicas www.iss.nl/bicas In collaboration with: Demeter (Droits et Egalite pour une Meilleure Economie de la Terre), Geneva Graduate Institute University of Amsterdam WOTRO/AISSR Project on Land Investments (Indonesia/Philippines) Université de Montréal – REINVENTERRA (Asia) Project Mekong Research Group, University of Sydney (AMRC) University of Wisconsin-Madison With funding support from: Legal Pluralism and Land Administration in West Sumatra: The Implementation of Local and Nagari Governments’ Regulations on Communal Land Tenure by Hilaire Tegnan Published by: BRICS Initiatives for Critical Agrarian Studies (BICAS) Email: [email protected] Websites: www.plaas.org.za/bicas | www.iss.nl/bicas MOSAIC Research Project Website: www.iss.nl/mosaic Land Deal Politics Initiative (LDPI) Email: [email protected] Website: www.iss.nl/ldpi RCSD Chiang Mai University Faculty of Social Sciences, Chiang Mai University Chiang Mai 50200 THAILAND Tel. 66­53­943595/6 | Fax. 66­53­893279 Email : [email protected] | Website : http://rcsd.soc.cmu.ac.th Transnational Institute PO Box 14656, 1001 LD Amsterdam, The Netherlands Tel: +31 20 662 66 08 | Fax: +31 20 675 71 76 E­mail: [email protected] | Website: www.tni.org May 2015 Published with financial support from Ford Foundation, Transnational Institute, NWO and DFID. Abstract Land administration has always been a delicate issue in the history of nations, and Indonesia, a country where a significant number of the population lives a pastoral life is not exempt from this reality. This paper discusses land tenure issues in West Sumatra, an Indonesian province which is home to the Minangkabau people with their long existing village management system known as Nagari, established to settle disputes based on adat (custom) principles as well as to protect the rights of the community members. These rights include communal land (referred to as tanahulayat hereafter). Long before the Dutch occupation of Indonesian archipelago, the nagari government was vested with powers to regulate communal land in West Sumatra. However, this authority was constantly overlooked by the then Dutch colonial administration as well as the post independence governments (both central and regional). To reinforce the Nagarigovernment as the guardian of the customary law (hukumadat) and to specify its jurisdiction, the Regional Government of West Sumatra enacted two laws between 2000 and 2008: Law No. 9/2000 repealed by Law No. 2/2007 and Law No. 6/2008 on communal land tenure. Although these two laws provide legal grounds to address land issues across the region, land conflicts still prevail in West Sumatra due to negligence of customary law, unkept promises as well as unsynchronized and contradictory regulations. The protests against the local army (Korem) in Nagari Kapalo Hilalang, against the oil palm company in Nagari Kinali, and against a cement factory in Nagari Lubuk Kilangan are cited in this paper as case references. Key words: Local Government, Nagari Government and Tanah Ulayat. Acknowledgement This research was made possible with the support of the Epistema Institution Jakarta, Indonesia. The author expresses his gratitude to the Law School of Andalas University Padang and Pusako, its Center for Constitution Study under the leadership of Professor Saldi Isra to whom I am really grateful. Introduction The legal system in Indonesia did not change very much after the country proclaimed its independence on August 17 1945 as many believe it did. The newly born republic operated on the same legal and political logic as its colonial predecessor, handing out titles as it deemed fit (Franz and Keebet Von Benda Beckmann, 2001). Before the arrival of Dutch traders and colonists in the late 16th century and early 17th century, indigenous kingdoms prevailed and applied a system of adat (Peter Mahmud Marzuki, 2011). In contemporary Indonesia, as in many other post colonial countries, three strands of laws prevail namely: State Law (Negara Hukum), Transnational Law (imposed by international organizations), and Adat law (comprising religious and traditional laws) as the government struggles to incorporate the rights of local people within the state legal system. However, the recognition of these rights either by the colonial administration or the political regimes that ensued was the starting point of a ‘weak legal pluralism’ as Griffiths put it, for it was done “rather in an ambiguous way and subject to the state’s regulatory control” (Franz and Keebet Von Benda Beckmann, 2001). The political concept known as Reformation Era (Era Reformasi) ensuing the fall of the Suharto’s regime in May 1998 is regarded as the Indonesian government’s attempt to bring about political, legal and social changes in respond to the people’s need for greater individual freedom, democracy, equality and justice for everyone. But more importantly it was a call for more regional autonomy and a greater recognition of adat rights to village resources (Kurnia Warman, 2010, 213-70). As a consequence, government power and authority were decentralized with more rights and obligations for districts and villages across Indonesia1. In West Sumatra this prompted the resurgence of the Nagari Government that was dormant (1979-1983) under Suharto’s regime. This article explains what the nagari concept and tanah ulayat refer to. It discusses the relationship between both state and Nagari Governments in dealing with communal land registration in West Sumatra, especially the difficulties involved and how to cope with them. The study was conducted in four Nagari from April 2013 to December 2014. The use of empirical data was required– that is ‘a people-based approach’ consisting of gathering information through direct interaction with people and processes, such as questionnaires and surveys as well as interviews with adat and religious leaders, legal institutions, nagari authorities, and parliament members. The research also used the ‘text-based approach’ which is based on acquiring information through texts, including statures, books, articles, newspapers, and reports. The use of empirical method as data collection technique was essential and efficient in my research for it aims at taking a closer look at the phenomenon being studied. What does Nagari government refer to? As stated earlier nagari is a traditional organization considered as the smallest unit of local government in the province of West Sumatra. A nagari is legally formed based on territorial and genealogical factors: its borders are defined and consists of four clan (orriginally) (Kurnia Warman, 2010). It is often refered to as the village republic in the2. To this day, the number of nagari is estimate up to 754 spread throughout twelve Regencies (Kecamatan) 3 . A nagari consists of several subdivisions called Jorong (subdivisions) and is governed by a Wali Nagari (representative) who is both a political and cultural leader, and a Nagari Council (Dewan Nagari) as the village legislative body. But this does not mean that the Nagari Council functions as a parallel legislative body in the 1 Law No.22/1999 on Regional Governments. 2 Franz von Benda-Beckmann and Keebet von Benda-Beckmann, Political and Legal Transformations of an Indonesian Polity: The Nagari from Colonisation to Decentralisation. P. 39-60 3 See Data Base Kerapatan Ada Nagari-Padang 2013. 1 region. The Regional People’s Representative Council (Dewan Perwakilan Rakyat Daerah) is the only law making body in the province of West Sumatra. Each Jorong is led by a Wakil Jorong. The legislative body (the Nagari Council) consists of representatives of kinship group leaders within the nagari (Afrizal, 2007-35). The existence of this traditional form of government dates as far back as the mid 14th century after the establishment of Pagaruyung Kingdom, a Melayu Kingdom consisting of the province of West Sumatra and its surrounding villages4. When the Dutch occupies Indonesia, They enacted on January 1, 1848 a law called Regeringsreglement (R.R) whose Article 62 gave certain rights to adat institutions to deal with family and land issues. In West Sumatra, it was Nagari government that carried out this responsibility back then and up to this day. This stature (R.R), patterned on the 1848 Netherlands Constitution was deemed as mere law in the Netherlands but was used in colonized Indonesia as a constitution 5. However, from the Pagaruyung Kingdom to this day, nagari has undergone several social and legal developments. In fact, after the independence, a new regulation called Makloemat (announcement) was passed in 1946 6 by the West Sumatran Local Government that split the leadership of nagari into three bodies: Dewan Perwakilan Nagari (Nagari Representive Council DPN), Dewan Harian Nagari (Nagari Daily Boards, DHN) and the Wali Nagari who is the head of both the DPN and the DHN 7. Furthermore, Nagari Government was again restructured in 1963 by another provincial regulation that set up three new bodies: Kepala Nagari (Nagari Head), Badan Musyawarah Nagari (the Nagari Discussion Boards, BMN) and the Badan Musyawarah Gabungan (the Combined Discusion Boards,