Goodbye Jakarta, hello Nusantara! Indonesia has acted, via a vote of its Parliament Tuesday, January 18, the transfer of the current capital towards a new city which remains to be built. This relocation project is a sea serpent that dates back to independence in 1945, but was officially revived three years ago.
After several postponements, it’s official, the new capital must be completed by 2045 (the first stones were to be laid in 2020 but the pandemic has disrupted the calendar). Buildings and infrastructure are still under construction, the redevelopment will be done in stages. From 2024, 25,000 civil servants will move there each year.
Why not keep Jakarta as the capital? Because the chaotic megalopolis of more than 30 million inhabitants, the largest in Southeast Asia, is becoming unlivable. It is paralyzed by huge traffic jams (which would cause the country to lose seven billion dollars every year), is suffocating pollution, finds itself regularly devastated by torrential rains and floods – it is sinking under the sea by 18 centimeters a year.
Jakarta, located on the island of Java, will remain the economic capital. But the objective is also to deconcentrate, to better distribute the development of the archipelago, because Java alone is home to 60% of the population.
Floods in the Jakarta region of Indonesia have killed at least 23 people, a toll that could rise further, the disaster management agency said. #AFP pic.twitter.com/JiTell6OGv
– Agence France-Presse (@afpfr) January 2, 2020
Nusantara, the new capital created from scratch, will be located on the island of Borneo, 1,500 kilometers from Java, in the province of East Kalimantan. It is a larger area, more central in the archipelago, less exposed to natural disasters but above all rich in an immense tropical forest, one of the largest in the world, shared between Indonesia, Malaysia and Brunei.
The first models show a futuristic (utopian?) city in the middle of the trees. Dwind turbines, footbridges and a future presidential palace in the shape of an immense Garuda, the mythological eagle of the national coat of arms. President Joko Widodo promises an innovative place to live where everything will be “accessible by bike or on foot“. This “zero emission city” would also be a center of attraction for international talent. The estimated budget is 33 billion dollars for now, 19% financed by the State. The rest will be paid for by private investments from Japan or the Emirates United Arabs.
Why did you choose the name Nusantara? The word means “archipelago”, in Indonesian. It was chosen out of 80 proposals because it was deemed the easiest to memorize. It is also a word that already describes the specificities of Indonesia. We speak for example of “Nusantara Islam” to designate the tolerant Islam of the Indonesians, of “Nusantara batik” or “Nusantara spice route”.
But this seduction operation is not enough, far from it, to win the support of the population. Environmentalists have warned the move could accelerate pollution in a hitherto relatively protected area and contribute to the destruction of rainforests that are home to orangutans endangered and the long-nosed monkeys. In anticipation of a expansion of the city, the State has indeed a reserve of land more than 256,000 hectares of green spaces, as many virgin surfaces which are likely to be victims of galloping urbanization in the years to come. They have not been heard.