65 brokers of vehicle papers arrested

JAKARTA (JP): The military police captured 65 "go-betweens" at both the vehicular document and driver's license services at the city police headquarters.

They included 10 women and one man who had stolen a vehicular document.

"It is part of Operation Cleansing," said Lt. Col. Latief Rabar, spokesman for the city police.

He talked to reporters yesterday afternoon in the company of Capt. Petrus, chief of the order surveillance office of the military police directorate, and Maj. Anton Bachrul Alam, the newly-installed chief of the driver's license service at the city police headquarters.

Petrus said the 65 go-betweens had been caught during several days of sweeping.

According to Petrus, the suspected thief of vehicle document had been transferred to the investigation directorate for further examination "since his action is a crime."

The suspect, identified as IS, 20, a resident of Ciracas subdistrict, East Jakarta, was captured on Wednesday while he was applying for a vehicular document of a "Mercedes Benz" using a faked document.

Petrus said the suspect had stolen the vehicular document of a motorbike at the service and altered the bike's identity printed on the document with that of the Mercedes Benz.

"It is the task of the investigators to find out how he stole the document and changed the vehicular identity," said Petrus.

The other go-betweens would soon be transferred to the South Jakarta mayoral security and order office "since their action is only considered as a violation of the municipal regulations", said Petrus.

Offenders

"Under our law, unauthorized brokering is a minor wrongdoing. Nevertheless, we shall consistently clear away all the offenders from this place," promised Petrus, who led the team of military police in capturing the offenders yesterday.

None among the offenders were police officers or people who claimed themselves journalists, which was the case in previous raids, said Petrus.

Unauthorized brokering remains a problem at the services, which is ascribed on one hand to the reluctance of the public to apply for the driver's licenses or vehicular documents themselves, and on the officers at the service who are ill-paid.

An applicant of a driver's license, who uses the service of go-betweens, often pay twice as much as the real cost -- less than Rp 60,000 (US$28) -- but they can avoid many tests in exchange.

The military police often make sweeping arrests of the brokers. But due to too mild a punishment it incurs under the municipal law, many of the offenders return to their profession after paying a maximum of Rp 10,000 ($4.60) in fines to the mayoral security and order office.

Anton said he would try his best to clear away the service from unauthorized broker activities and to adopt punitive measures against his recalcitrant subordinates.

"I'll try my best, but I can't do it without help from many parties, including the journalists," said Anton. (jsk)