Willem Loots responds to this week’s story that the Bali governor Made Mangku Pastika has caved in to the public opposition to the planned massive reclamation of more than 800 hectares of land at Benoa Bay for a Disney-style resort.
The subtitle Bali’s theme park dream bows to protests (TravelMole August 20) should have read: An environmental disaster avoided.
The pipe dream of a theme park on reclaimed land in Benoa was in fact a nightmare and certainly not an idea that came from any native Balinese.
The project was dreamed up by a bunch of megalomaniacs from Jakarta who already built a shopping mall right on the beach in Kuta.
Their arguments were as absurd as they were disingenuous.
They claimed the reclamation project would reduce the impact of tsunamis, erosion and abrasion.
In addition it would reduce traffic congestion in the southern part of the island.
It would repair the environmental quality in the surrounding areas and finally would save the island’s rice fields from being exploited and transformed into tourism facilities.
It is too late to argue against shopping malls that disfigure the coastline but these so-called ‘local investors’ are a grave danger to the sustainability of Bali as a tourism destination.
Willem Loots
Puri Pangaea,
Pantai Seseh, Bali
