Dhammika Heenpela
Member of DPRD, Janlif T Bullu, also state his willingness to coordinate with DPRD NTT in handling the fisheries to address the issue faced by the fishermen.
In dealing with the issue, the head of commission DPRD Kupang, Tellendmark Daud, promised to recommend to marine fisheries agency of Kupang to coordinate with the agency of NTT province to control the fishermen from outside NTT.
There are 203 known units of fish aggregation devices owned by fishermen from outside NTT, spread around the waters of Kupang. Besides that, there are 8 units of boats owned by a number of businessmen from Sumbawa that uses potassium to catch fishes, although here are regulations against catching fishes by using compressor tools.
The government of NTT province and Kupang local administration was asked by the fishermen to uninstall the fish aggregation device at the entrance of Kupang, as this brings out a bad impact to the fishermen that receives help from boats of Kupang local adminitration.Due to the decline of the catch, many fishermen chose not to fish as to close the operational cost itself is difficult.
After the Sawu sea was stated as the conservation area, where the use of fish aggregation device is prohibited.The result of the installation of the fish aggregation device was a decline in income of the local fishermen. Prior to the installation, the average income reached Rp13 million to Rp14 million. However, after the installation, the income declined to as low as Rp2 million to Rp3 million.
The absence of response from the two instances is allegedly due to a conspiracy between two officials of the agency and fishermen from outside NTT.
This is due to manner of a number of fishermen from outside NTT, installing fish aggregation device in the Sawu sea and in the entrance of fishes heading to Kupang area. This has been reported to the marine fisheries agencies of NTT and Kupang, to no response.
The government in Kupang have been asked to control the fishermen from outside NTT, but operating in the territorial waters of Kupang.
So, what can the fisherman to do??