Enjoy Jakarta?<\/p>\n
Historian Ridwan Saidi claimed the anniversary of Jakarta did
\nnot fall on June 22. The native Jakartan said the date now
\ncommonly accepted as the day Jakarta was founded was actually the
\ndate when Fatahillah, or Faletehan, attacked Jakarta on the
\norders of king Cirebon in the early 16th century.<\/p>\n
With respect to history, what Jakartans really need is not the
\ndate on which the city was founded. Residents need to see that
\nthe administration is doing something to make Jakarta a more
\nlivable city.<\/p>\n
The anniversary of the capital is marked each year with an
\nevent called the Jakarta Fair. Unfortunately, this expensive fair
\nhas become little more than a mask to hide the failure of
\nsuccessive administrations to make Jakarta a better city for its
\nresidents.<\/p>\n
Abraham Lincoln once said, \"I am a slow walker, but I never
\nwalk back.\" Those involved in managing Jakarta are more than slow
\nwalkers; they seem to be reluctant to walk at all.<\/p>\n
The result is that from year to year, residents can see little
\nif any progress in all aspects of public service.<\/p>\n
In terms of democracy, Jakarta, which is generally held up as
\nan example and the barometer for other cities in the country, has
\nmade absolutely no progress. As a province, Jakarta, which has
\nsix municipalities, does not have a single legislative body at
\nthe municipal level. The absence of such local legislative bodies
\nhas made it impossible for residents to elect their mayors
\ndirectly. The governor wields the power to appoint mayors, who
\nwill naturally feel that their loyalty and responsibility lies
\nmore with the governor than with residents.<\/p>\n
Public services remain another area of concern. A recent
\nsurvey by the Indonesian Institute for Civil Society, in
\ncooperation with the European Union and the Partnership for
\nGovernance Reform in Indonesia, found that the level of public
\nservice in the city depended on how much residents could pay. The
\nmajority of survey respondents, interviewed in 80 subdistricts
\nthroughout the capital, said the response of officials to their
\nneeds depended on how much money they could give the officials.
\nNo one has denied the results of the survey.<\/p>\n
Residents' demands for improved employment opportunities,
\nsecurity, public transportation and flood and pollution control
\nhave received little more than lip service from the
\nadministration.<\/p>\n
The administration seems to be helpless to deal with rising
\nunemployment. The answer is not to build more shopping malls,
\nwhich mainly creates jobs for poorly educated construction
\nworkers and shopkeepers.<\/p>\n
Crime remains a major concern in the city. The large number of
\nillegal gambling establishments in Jakarta raises serious
\nquestions about law enforcement here. Every large rainstorm
\nleaves residents worried about flooding, a sign of the
\nadministration's failure to establish an effective flood control
\nsystem.<\/p>\n
Jakarta, with at least 2.5 million private cars, 3.8 million
\nmotorcycles and 255,000 public transportation vehicles on the
\nroads, is the world's third most polluted city after Bangkok and
\nMexico City. As the skies grow dirtier and dirtier, residents are
\nleft to wonder about officials' commitment to cleaning up the
\nair.<\/p>\n
The only effort of note to improve public transportation is
\nthe administration's introduction of the busway, which continues
\nto attract more passengers. TransJakarta buses have become the
\nonly alternative for those who want to spend less time getting to
\nand from work. However, because it covers such a limited area,
\nthe \"success\" of the busway does not reflect any true success in
\nmoving people around the capital. What the densely populated city
\nreally needs is a mass rapid transit (MRT) system.<\/p>\n
On the streets, poor traffic enforcement encourages motorists
\nto violate traffic regulations, endangering themselves and
\neveryone else on the roads. Motorcyclists behave like ghosts,
\nfloating through traffic lights as if they did not even exist.<\/p>\n
Jakarta cannot overcome the enormous challenges it faces
\nwithout help from the neighboring provinces of West Java and
\nBanten. The garbage dump dispute between Jakarta and West Java is
\na recent example of this need to work together.<\/p>\n
With migrants continuing to pour into Jakarta, unchecked
\nurbanization is often cited as a major factor in many of the
\ncapital's woes. The only remedy is regional autonomy, which
\nempowers provinces to create jobs for their residents. It is
\nhoped that more job opportunities in other provinces will stop
\npeople from pouring into Jakarta looking for work. From this it
\nis clear that \"mending\" Jakarta is a national issue.<\/p>\n
Given the complexity of the problems, it would be natural for
\npeople to assume that Jakarta will only grow worse; or, at the
\nvery least, that no significant improvements will be seen. Every
\nplan to make Jakarta a more livable city seems to die on the
\nvine. And the older Jakarta gets, the worse and more complex its
\nproblems.<\/p>\n
Therefore, as we mark the 478th anniversary of Jakarta,
\nGovernor Sutiyoso should take heed of something Charles Dickens
\nwrote in A Tale of Two Cities: \"I am like one who died young, all
\nmy life might have been.\"<\/p>",
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"sponsor": "Okusi Associates",
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