Probably the government never fully intends to provide decent and affordable public housing, not comprehending how it can promote the quality of life of its citizens and help build a stronger city economy—as corruptible as ever, too, if they wish.

A friend once commented, outrageously, on Rusunami [Rumah Susun Sederhana Milik—Proprietary Flats] and Rusunawa [Rumah Susun Sederhana Sewa—Lease Flats] projects. He no longer cared how much percentage of the project value the government corrupts, as long as the project was carried out decently. But, as we all know, the 1,000-tower project is presently on hold. Lack of planning, coordination, and above all, the willingness of the government, has resulted in only 63 units are actually occupied, from as little as 18o units built so far across Jabodetabek area and Surabaya. Not to mention the quality of its construction. The price went up from 114 million rupiah to 180 million. Some units have been, to the contrary of the project’s initial objective, bought by upper middle class—in the name of investment. Meanwhile, there are buildings with units not yet supplied with electricity and utterly abandoned that snakes start to nest.

While the projects are postponed indefinitely, the government has recently planned to launch 100,000 units of Super Affordable Housing project, which will encounter the same problem: difficulty in acquiring downtown land lots. A problem unable, or unintended, to be solved by the government, causing developers, certainly unwilling to bear loss, to turn their heads to less costly suburban areas to build subsidized flats, and free themselves from being responsible for the unavailability of supporting infrastructure that the government, again, fails to provide. It is not surprising that many people refuse the idea of living in those flats, being deserted in faraway places. The future location of Super Affordable Housing, requiring a vast parcel of land, is eventually jeopardized to occupy the suburb as well. This will not solve the problem of high number of commuters, especially in major cities such as Jakarta, let alone to comply with the standard logic of the importance of accommodating middle and lower class to live downtown for a more productive, efficient, affordable city life with, of course, better quality of life.

Today, a majority of citizens of productive age range live in their parents’ or in-laws’ house, in either shabby or overwhelmingly luxurious rented rooms, as well as in low-grade rented row houses or flats. Meanwhile, apartments have become the investment tool of the upper class, depriving the rights of many lower class citizens. One of the excuses made by the government on public housing settlements revolves on the difficulty of acquiring land lots in downtown areas: even to build a modest flat would require a sizeable piece of land. But have the city spaces indeed been fully occupied?

Actually, there are plenty of ways left to provide public housing, from “snatching” away unoccupied posh apartments to “stealing” the oversized homes of the rich—just as allegedly being researched by Belgian government. It is of course too impossible to imagine, especially for us who gradually lose our imagination ability each day, along with the elimination of our hope.

However, there are still forgotten spaces. Neglected spaces that may well be alternatives to public housing for middle class at least, or even lower class at once. Those derelict spaces are the upper floors of every ruko [rumah-toko, shophouse] and rukan [rumah-kantor, office-house] build not only in the centers of but also in the entire city area.

In the course of time, the function of ruko's, commonly found in Southeast Asian cities, has shifted from the original intention to provide both residential and commercial space in one location for Chinese migrants. After the colonial racial housing policy (1835 – 1915) was abolished, Chinese migrants had become free to reside outside Chinatown area, stimulating developments of rukocomplexes in different areas of the city. Changes in lifestyle eventually make home storeowners fled, leaving the spaces vacant. Newer ruko complexes were later built as speculation tool in estate business. The upper floors of both old and new ruko's end up being misused as storage or sleeping barracks for employees of the store.

There is an important factor in building a ruko complex: semi-detached staircase. Most ruko units are not built with semi-detached staircase, allowing only one entrance to the second floor through the store or restaurant that occupies the ground floor. Dwelling space is separated from public streets by commercial space. Understandably, once the owner is able to buy a new house, convenient and separated with commercial space, the unit will no longer be occupied as a home. Strangely, developers continue to build new ruko complexes based upon this original concept of ruko ownership, inclusive of its upper floors. The idea of having semi-detached staircases that would enable them to offer upper floors to different future tenants has never been realized. With 5 – 6 meters width and more than 10 meters length, a ruko unit is in fact the ideal size for a small family to dwell in. Other tenants could actually rent vacant upper floors if only they had separate access through semi-detached staircase. In Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, modest apartments on the upper floors of such ruko' sare commonly found, and probably in other Southeast Asian countries as well.

Is the idea feasible? It might be, just as Rusunami and Rusunawa projects may as well succeed. With the many ruko complexes readily available in city centers, land acquisition is no longer a problem. What the government needs to do is to look for the data of all unoccupied upper floors of ruko units. Buy those units or even the whole complex, to preserve only the original owners’ rights of tenure by long lease; or persuade original owners to rent their upper floors to other tenants through revenue sharing or with a reward of tax reduction. Administer everything through independent management under government supervision, which will ensure affordable rental price for the middle or lower middle class—albeit the strategic location downtown. Location of ruko's can be adjusted to future tenants’ work places. Bottom line, there shouldn’t be unused spaces on the upper floors of every home store unit.

Aside than that, semi-detached staircase is crucial, although it will reduce the original space of home store unit previously built with indoor staircase and will incite a series of other technicalities. Another issue is security and convenience with regard to surrounding areas that will need to be enhanced in order to support this “new living culture.” Not everyone will feel safe living on the upper floor of a ruko with their covered staircases leading directly to street sidewalks. If surrounding areas were firstly made convenient, safe, and friendly, the presence of this new settlement may be complemented with parks within certain distance to provide playing ground for the “newbies” to socialize with children of neighboring residents. Attractive discount may be given to early-bird tenants as exemplars to draw attention of more future tenants for this new “apartment” concept.

The usage of the upper floors of ruko's as apartments for the middle and lower-middle class is in accord with the currently presented solution such as affordable housing, flats, and apartments. If you still think the idea is unfeasible, considering the chaos this country has shown in providing affordable settlement for its citizens, at least it adds up as a new form of protest that can be addressed not only to overly luxurious apartment projects, substandard flats, or government-subsidized flats and the highly dubious Super Affordable Housing; but also as a criticism toward wasted, unused spaces of the upper floors belong to existing ruko's and rukan's.***


 

Ardi Yunanto is the editor of Karbonjournal.org
Thanks to Jemi Irwansyah, Joko Adianto, Mohammad Nanda Widyarta, Setiadi Sopandi, and Prathiwi Widyatmi Putri, for their support and references.