Indonesia to build homes for quake survivors

The Indonesian government plans to build hundreds of houses on the safer ground for the survivors of the earthquake that struck West Java province, the chief of the Southeast Asian archipelago’s disaster agency said on Sunday.

Suharyanto, head of the National Disaster Management and Mitigation Agency, told a news conference that the Ministry of Public Works and Public Housing would start constructing new houses on a two-hectare land next week.

According to him, the 5.6-magnitude quake destroyed 62,628 homes.

The relocation would prioritize survivors whose houses were destroyed by the temblor and located in areas prohibited by the country’s meteorology, climatology and geophysics agency from rebuilding, said Suharyanto, who, like many Indonesians, goes by one name.

Two hundred housing units would be rebuilt in the new location, Herman Suherman, head of the Cianjur district administration, told the news conference.

For the houses that have been severely damaged, but are still eligible to be rebuilt in their original location, Suharyanto said the government would provide financial assistance of up to 50 million rupiahs ($3,186) for reconstruction.

The government would provide 25 million rupiahs to the quake victims whose houses were moderately damaged by the quake and 10 million rupiahs to those whose houses got minor damages, he added.

As of Sunday, the death toll rose to 321. Eleven others were missing and 73,874 people were displaced.

Agencies