Damage to Obi Island Due to the Nickel Industry
On April 12, a nickel company, PT Trimegah Bangun Persada Tbk, conducted an initial public offering (IPO) listing on the stock exchange in Jakarta. That day, the people of Obi Island, North Maluku, together with the Mining Advocacy Network (Jatam), Enter Nusantara and Trend Asia staged an action at the Indonesia Stock Exchange (IDX) Office, Jakarta.
Trimegah started its initial offering for 10 days on March 15-24. The offering period continues, on April 12 it was listed on the Indonesia Stock Exchange.
This action is to appeal to brokers, as public intermediaries in buying and selling shares regarding the dangers of nickel investment.
On Obi Island, North Maluku, Trimegah operates its first high pressure acid leaching (HPAL) smelter with nickel production of 60,000 tons per year.
This smelter converts local low grade ore into mixed hydroxide precipitate, a form of nickel which can be further processed to make electric vehicle batteries. Muh Jamil, from Jatam said, this action was to show the track record of environmental and humanitarian crimes from the Harita Group's operations in Obi. At the same time, showing Trimegah stockbrokers is a risky investment, damaging the environment and supporting the deprivation of people's living space.
Jatam also disclosed that a company that destroys people's clean water sources and poisons the sea, in its operations, PT Trimegah Bangun Persada, together with PT Gane Sentosa Permai, PT Persada Lygend, PT Mega Surya Pertiwi, and PT Halmahera Jaya Feronikel on Obi Island. All of these companies are under the flag of the Harita Group.
The company, which is owned by the conglomerate family Lim Haryanto Wijaya Sarwono, is engaged in the natural resources sector, ranging from nickel, bauskit, coal, oil palm plantations to shipping and timber businesses.
Efforts to raise additional capital of this size are inseparable from plans to build a second nickel processing plant on Obi Island. This factory uses the HPAL process operated by PT Halmahera Persada Lygend (HPL). This factory began construction in 2018 with a capital of US$1.5 billion, a joint venture with Zhejang Lygend Investment Co., Ltd.
Melky Nahar, Jatam National Coordinator said, Trimegah's IPO step took place in the midst of suffering from residents and the environment. Nickel extraction from the Harita Group company left a long and irreversible destructive power.
The Harita Group nickel mine has been operating since 2010 in Kawasi Village, Obi. Since then, the land, coast and sea, where the Kawasi people depend for their lives, have turned into mining areas.
"The process of annexing residents' lands was shrouded in violence and intimidation, and even some residents who refused to have their land evicted were faced with repressive actions by the state apparatus and companies," said Melky.
Companies, he said, always use tactics, by breaking through first and then negotiating. This strategy, apart from being detrimental, also narrowed the people's choices to survive on the land that was destroyed and surrounded by mining.
"At the same time, the company claims that the land it forcibly intrudes belongs to the state, even though the residents have controlled it for decades, and even pay taxes," he said.
Polluted Water
Upiawan Umar, a North Maluku environmental activist, said that the water sources for Kawasi residents were polluted because of an overflow of nickel ore that entered the waters. It's like what happened to the Toduku Waterfall and River.
Even though it is polluted, residents still use the water. Residents who have money can buy gallons of water, those who are on a mediocre economy have no other choice, they still boil the water.
Air Cermin and Sungai Loji, which were previously used by residents as a source of clean water, for example, said Upi, have now disappeared after the company cleared most of the forest on the mainland to the coast.
The Ake Lamo River, the largest river on Obi Island, has been demolished by mining companies. The hills as the flow area and the river body have been stripped, causing the river to be polluted and damaged.
Pipes for waste disposal from the company's exploration activities are thought to lead to the sea, causing ecosystems and fish to be vulnerable to heavy metal contamination. This condition refers to Muhammad Aris' research in the journal "Heavy Metal (Ni, Fe) Concentration in Water and Histopathological of Marine Fish, in the Obi Island, Indonesia" (2020).
The research said that heavy metal pollution in Obi waters accumulated in the physiology of fish. Metals that contaminate seawater can be eaten by plankton, then plankton are eaten by small fish and large fish.
In addition to water sources, exploitation and deprivation of living space also worsen air quality. According to Jatam's report, Kawasi residents must breathe the 'air of death' every day from the coal dust of the PLTU from the Harita Nickel industrial area.
The coal-fired power plant which supports the operation of the nickel industry pollutes the air and causes the health of residents to suffer. Proximity to residential areas makes residents vulnerable to toxic pollution.
During summer, kitchen equipment, dining table, chairs, floors and rooms are full of dust. The women have to clean the dirt every day. Toddlers often cry because of the noise from the industrial area.
Residents admit that almost every day there are small children and adults who are brought to the village health facility, the medical grounds are not even equipped. In Jatam's records, officers at the Kawasi Polindes admitted that acute respiratory infections (ARI) were the main problem in Kawasi.
“Most of the patients are toddlers. There were 124 babies aged 0-1 years who visited the Polindes from January to December 2021. There were 283 toddlers aged 1-5 years, followed by 179 people in the 20-44 year old group,” noted Jatam referring to an article published by Indoprogress.
The citizens were eliminated
After the residents' living spaces were confiscated, said Melky, the Kawasi residents would also be forced to move to new housing or 'ecovillage' built by the company. The location is about five kilometers in the southern part of Kawasi.
"Forced efforts to impoverish and uproot indigenous people from their villages, their living space which is full of history," he said.
Companies and the government claim that the settlements near are slums, near the sea, in an earthquake-prone zone and close to industrial areas.
Melky said, pouring in money from the IPO would speed up the production process to gain multiple profits. Meanwhile for local residents it is a source of disaster that risks their future and living space.
Anie Rahmi, Harita Nickel's Corporate Affairs Manager , said that what Jatam said in the report was "misleading."
In a written statement received by Mongabay , Anie denied that there had been land grabbing and pollution of residents' water sources. He said that all of the company's operational areas are in production forest and conversion production forest areas. The company, he said, holds a lease-to-use forest area permit (IPPKH) for every land clearing.
Regarding the pollution of residents' water sources, Anie said the company did not dispose of nickel ore into the Toduku and Ake Lamo Rivers.
The remaining nickel processing results, he said, were placed in mine outs in the form of dry tailings according to the technical approval and operational feasibility letter (SLO) from the Ministry of Environment and Forestry (KLHK).
He said the company had obtained an environmental permit and environmental management permit from the government since 2010. Harita was also designated as a national strategic project.
"We also have permits and technical approvals from the government for the processing of residual or waste products, the remaining results of this process are managed first and released into the environment by meeting established quality standards and reported periodically to the government," he said.
During its operation, Anie said, the company's waste management received regular inspections and supervision from the central, provincial and district governments.
It is also not true, he said, that the sewage pipes are thought to lead to the sea causing the ecosystem and fish to be vulnerable to contamination.
“This is also very misleading. There is no exploration pipeline to the sea," explained Anie.
Regarding the relocation of residents to ecovillage, he said, it was a government program supported by companies. The current settlement is too dense and results in an unhealthy environment.
Anie claims that the new settlement will increase the living standards of the community, equipped with adequate facilities. He said the ecovillage program is supported by the majority of the community.
Residents of Kawasi said that currently the company is intensively repairing the village, the coast and the Toduku River. This happened after there was pressure from the media and protests from residents.
Garbage that last year piled up on the coast and settled on the sidelines of the river has been cleaned up. Every day, he said, there are officers always cleaning.
However, there has been no significant change. Every day the environment is always dirty. Residents continue to inhale dust from industrial activities and coal-fired power plants. Cases of land conflicts since mid-2017-2018 that displaced people's plantation lands are still lingering on the courts.
Meanwhile, said another resident, the sediment that had settled in the Toduku River had been sucked up by the company. The body of water is even more widened, changed to no longer natural. In fact, around the Toduku River is a mangrove ecosystem and a place for river biota to live.
Small repairs made by the company, he said, don't mean at all that in the end residents have to relocate.
Diarrhea claimed lives
In addition to environmental damage and land issues, health threats also haunt residents. From state media, LKBN Antara, the South Halmahera Health Service released from January to early March 2023, recording 520 cases of diarrhea and some causing death.
Asia Hasyim, Head of the South Halmahera Health Service, said diarrhea was mostly reported on Obi Island, which is a nickel mining and industrial area.
"Obi Island with the first case and the highest case is in South Halmahera, three people have even been reported dead," he told Antara in Labuha.
According to reports from health workers, diarrheal diseases attack children under five years to adults. Diarrhea in Obi, he said, cannot be separated from the problem of clean water in the mining area.
The Health Office works together with companies and village governments to ensure that the residents' water supplies are free from contamination by bacteria and germs that cause disease. They distribute chlorine for water disinfection to prevent an increase in cases of diarrhea.
What happened in North Maluku, said Masri Santuli, a North Maluku environmental activist shows, is a real betrayal of Article 33 of the 1945 Constitution which affirms natural wealth for the prosperity of the people.
This academic at the Muhammadyah University of Ternate reminded investors to be sensitive in buying investments. According to Masri, the state or government should not facilitate the exploitation of its own people.
