In a joint statement led by Olivier De Schutter, UN Special Rapporteur on extreme poverty and human rights, the experts highlighted expulsions of local communities and destruction of houses, fields, water sources, cultural and religious sites, as the Indonesian Government and the country’s Tourism Development Corporation (ITDC) “groomed Mandalika to become a ‘New Bali’.
“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”, the experts said.
The Government’s aim is to create an enormous tourism complex in Mandalika, which is situated in Lombok’s impoverished West Nusa Tenggara Province, with a Grand Prix motorcycle circuit, parks, resorts and hotels, the experts added.
To date, the project has attracted more than $1 billion in private investment and is being managed by Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB), a multilateral financial institution.
Lack of due diligence
The rights experts also criticised a lack of due diligence by the AIIB and private businesses to identify, prevent, mitigate and account for how they address adverse human rights impacts, as set forth in the UN Guiding Principles on business and human rights.
“In light of the dark history of human rights violations and land grabs in the region, the AIIB and businesses cannot look the other way and carry on business as usual”, the experts said.
“Their failure to prevent and address risks of human rights abuses is tantamount to being complicit in such abuses”, they added.
In March 2021, several UN experts voiced their concerns in joint communications to the Indonesian Government, the ITDC and the AIIB, as well as to concerned private companies involved in the project as well as their home States, France, Spain and the United States, the statement noted.
This is an excerpt from an article originally published on UN News.
