Tangerang, 1 Desember, 2025 — Severe floods that began on November 25, 2025, struck Aceh, West Sumatra, and North Sumatra, displacing thousands of residents and disrupting transportation, education, and economic activities. Triggered by days of heavy rainfall, the disaster has drawn national attention after large amounts of neatly cut and numbered logs were found drifting in the floodwaters, raising public suspicion of massive deforestation. While the government denies illegal logging claims and states the wood came from private land, public criticism has intensified as volunteer-led aid reached isolated areas faster than official state response.
Behind this disaster, strong suspicions have emerged that environmental destruction has intensified the scale of the flooding. In many affected areas, residents discovered large wooden logs drifting with the floodwaters. The logs appeared neatly cut, some even marked and numbered, raising public concern over large-scale deforestation in upstream areas. This phenomenon was not isolated to one region but was found across several flooded zones, reinforcing the belief that massive forest destruction has occurred systematically.
In response to public accusations of large-scale deforestation, the government denied that the drifting logs were evidence of illegal forest clearing. As reported by Kompas.com, the Director General of Law Enforcement at the Ministry of Forestry, Dwi Januanto Nugroho, stated that the logs were suspected to belong to private land-right holders (PHAT) located in areas designated for other land use (APL). He explained that the logs appeared to be old and decayed remnants of logging activities that had not yet been transported. However, this clarification has not fully eased public suspicion, as similar findings were reported across multiple flooded regions, reinforcing concerns over systematic forest destruction.
At the same time, several local governments admitted that they lacked the resources to handle the disaster effectively. However, the response from the central government was widely perceived as slow. In the critical early days of the flooding, many isolated areas had yet to receive official assistance. Broken access routes, limited medical services, and shortages of food and clean water became daily struggles for the victims.
Ironically, faster and more effective help came from civil society. Through fundraising efforts led by public figures such as Ferry Irwandi and Praz Teguh, donations of food, medicine, and emergency supplies were quickly collected and distributed. Volunteer teams were even able to reach isolated regions that had not yet been accessed by official aid. This wave of public solidarity highlighted a painful contrast: at a time of crisis, ordinary citizens moved faster than the state, strengthening public criticism that the government was not fully serious in handling the disaster.
Today, the floods in Sumatera are no longer seen as merely a natural disaster. They have become a symbol of environmental crisis, unequal disaster management, and the weakening presence of the state in protecting its people. Residents have lost not only their homes and possessions, but also their sense of security about the future of their environment. As floodwaters slowly recede, a critical question remains unanswered: how long will forest destruction continue to be denied, and how long must the people wait for the state to truly stand with them in times of disaster?
source: https://nasional.kompas.com/read/2025/12/02/05121261/misteri-kayu-kayu-gelondongan-di-banjir-sumatera
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