Indonesian authorities plan to move the country's capital from overcrowded Jakarta to the island of Borneo
As BBC notes, the reasons for the move are obvious. Jakarta is gradually sinking, at an average rate of 1 to 15 centimeters per year, and according to scientists, it could be completely underwater by 2050. Almost half the city is already below sea level, as Jakarta is located in a swampy area, washed by the Java Sea, and 13 rivers flow through the city.
In addition, Jakarta has monstrous traffic jams – the worst in the world, according to a 2016 study. The city is home to 30 million people, and only 2-4% of wastewater is treated.
The new capital will be located on Kalimantan – the Indonesian part of Borneo, an island divided among three states. This will cost the authorities $33 billion and require 30 to 40 thousand hectares to accommodate 900,000 to 1.5 million people.
The main contender for the title of new capital is the city of Palangkaraya, located in the center of the island. Firstly, it is geographically closer to the center of the Indonesian archipelago, and secondly, the founding father of Indonesian statehood and national hero Sukarno also proposed this city as the capital.
Countries sometimes move their capitals from one city to another for various reasons, so Indonesia is far from the first in this regard. Let us recall other most famous examples from relatively recent history.
1. KAZAKHSTAN
In 1997, President of Kazakhstan Nursultan Nazarbayev decided to move the capital from the main city of Almaty. For the new administrative and political center, he chose a provincial city 1,200 km north of the capital – Akmola, which means "white shrine" in Kazakh.
First of all, he gave the city a new name – Astana. However, the city had been renamed many times before: until 1992 it was known as Tselinograd, and until 1961 as Akmolinsk.
Then Nazarbayev summoned architects from around the world to Astana to give the city a monumental capital appearance, and one of the new architectural landmarks became Khan Shatyr – a colossal shopping and entertainment center built in the form of a transparent tent by the famous British architect Norman Foster.
A new monument also grew in the city – the Baiterek tower, which is an openwork tree trunk, in the crown of which lies a gilded glass ball, symbolizing an egg laid by the sacred bird Samruk. There is an observation deck there, from which you can admire other architectural novelties of the city – the presidential palace and the Central Concert Hall.
All this became possible due to the growing oil sector, thanks to which the country's economy grew by 4.8% in 2018. In March 2019, Nursultan Nazarbayev resigned his presidential powers, and parliament voted to rename the new capital in his honor, and the city became known as Nur-Sultan.
Not bad at all for a settlement that housed the Akmola Camp for Wives of Traitors to the Motherland, or A.L.Zh.I.R., during Stalin's times.
2. MYANMAR
The city of Naypyidaw covers an area four times larger than that of a not-so-small city like London, but has far fewer residents. It is a city with a short – so far – history: it has existed since 2005, and before that there was a small village here. Naypyidaw means "abode of the king," but why exactly here, 370 km from the largest city Yangon, the capital was moved remains largely a mystery.
When this happened, in November 2005, the then Minister of Information explained the move to the BBC as a more convenient, central location for the new capital, but analysts believed that the country's military leadership was likely afraid of a foreign invasion from the sea or wanted to better control ethnic minorities living in border regions. There were also suggestions that Myanmar's secretive military leaders were simply repeating the habits of pre-colonial Burmese kings, who built new cities and palaces on the advice of soothsayers.
Now Naypyidaw has all the signs of a master-planned capital: the main street leading from the parliament building to the presidential palace has 20 lanes, but traffic flow is light.
The boulevards are lined with shiny new shopping malls and empty five-star hotels. The city also has a safari park, a zoo, and three stadiums. And, unlike other parts of Myanmar, electricity is supplied here around the clock.
3. BOLIVIA
Bolivia has two capitals – Sucre and La Paz. Sucre was the sole capital until 1899, when it lost to the city of La Paz during a brief civil war. After that, parliament and the entire bureaucratic apparatus moved to Bolivia's largest city, La Paz, while all judicial bodies remained in Sucre.
Sucre is located in the center of the country, exactly where Bolivia was founded in 1825. The city's population is only 250,000 compared to 1.7 million in La Paz.
In 2007, a proposal was made to move parliament and government institutions back to Sucre, but a serious protest erupted in La Paz over this. Behind this was a confrontation between supporters of President Evo Morales from the poorest western regions and his opponents from the more prosperous eastern regions. The idea was eventually abandoned, and so Bolivia still has two capitals.
4. NIGERIA
Until 1991, Nigeria's largest city, Lagos, was also the country's capital. There were several reasons for moving the main city to Abuja: firstly, its central location, away from the coast. Secondly, Lagos was already very overcrowded, the most populous city among all sub-Saharan African cities.
Also, in a political and ethnic sense, Abuja was a neutral city, given that in Lagos the majority of the population were Yoruba, while the Igbo dominated the southeast and the Hausa the northwest. This was important, recalling that from 1967 to 1970 the country was embroiled in the Biafran-Nigerian war, and the Igbo wanted to secede from the Nigerian union.
While Lagos developed spontaneously, Abuja became the first city in Nigeria built according to a plan. Lagos is notoriously known for its traffic jams, but in Abuja the roads were initially designed with growing traffic flow in mind.
The new capital also has cultural institutions, a presidential palace, the National Assembly building, and the Supreme Court. Although a number of federal-level institutions still unofficially remain in Lagos.
5. PORTUGAL
For 13 years, the capital of Portugal was not Lisbon at all, but Rio de Janeiro. Why? Because of Napoleon.
During the Peninsular War (1807-1814), the French captured Portugal three times. A few days before the invasion of Napoleon's army in December 1807, the ruling Braganza dynasty fled to Brazil, then a Portuguese colony, and arrived in Rio in March 1808.
At the beginning of the 19th century, Rio was a thriving city: trade in gold, diamonds, and sugar flourished. About a third of the population – nearly 1 million people – were slaves.
There, the Portuguese prince regent John VI formed the United Kingdom of Portugal, Brazil, and the Algarves, which immediately elevated Brazil's status from colonial to equal with Portugal. The country also gained greater administrative autonomy.
In 1816, after the death of Queen Maria I of Portugal, John VI became king, and in 1821 the royal court returned to Lisbon, and accordingly the city regained its capital status.
However, the stay of the Portuguese royal court in Rio left an indelible mark not only on this metropolis but on all of Brazil, spurring economic development and accelerating the drive for independence.
6. TURKEY
Many tourists arriving in Istanbul today still think they have come to the capital of Turkey. However, this is not the case. When on October 13, 1923, Istanbul handed over the reins of power to Ankara, it was one of the most populous metropolises on the European continent, while Ankara was a city with a population of 35,000.
Why was this done? The fact is that after World War I, most of the Ottoman Empire was occupied by the Allied Powers – even Istanbul, which held a strategic position linking the Black and Mediterranean Seas. By the way, it was still called Constantinople then, and was renamed Istanbul later, in 1930.
The founder of modern Turkey and its first president, Kemal Atatürk, proposed moving the capital inland to Ankara, a city on the Anatolian plateau. Ankara, located at an altitude of 938 meters above sea level, may be inferior to Istanbul in grandeur, history, and diversity of cultural life, but it is now also a multi-million city that invariably attracts tourists.
Its name dates back to ancient times and is derived from the Greek "Angora." It was under this name that the city was known in antiquity, and it is from here that Angora cats, Angora rabbits, and accordingly Angora wool originated.