Action urged over public facilities
JAKARTA (JP): City councilors said yesterday they expected Jakarta's next governor to aggressively tackle one of the city's oldest problems: urging real-estate developers to abide by their obligations to construct social and public facilities.
They made the remarks because they said many developers still failed to fulfill their obligations. This was in spite of strong legal backing, including Presidential Decree No.5/1974, a ministerial regulation and gubernatorial decree and instructions.
Incumbent Governor Surjadi Soedirdja's term of office ends on Oct. 5. Three candidates for the governorship, including Jakarta Military Commander Maj. Gen. Sutiyoso, have been proposed by the City Council to the Ministry of Home Affairs.
Councilor Helmy AR Syihab of Commission D for development affairs said that social and public facilities to be built by developers would belong to the city administration.
"The failure to collect social and public facilities from developers is caused mainly by city officials' lack of 'willingness'. The new governor is responsible for the collection of the facilities," Helmy said.
Data shows that the municipality still has to collect around 1.8 million square meters of social and public facilities from developers.
According to the presidential decree and minister of home affairs regulations No. 5/1974 and No.1/1987, developers' obligations regarding social and public facilities cover 40 percent of their project's area.
Gubernatorial decree No. 540/1990 also stipulates that the social and public facilities, ranging from school buildings, places of worship and parks to low-cost apartments have to be handed over to the municipality as city property.
Saud Rachman of Commission D for development affairs said that based on the governor's instruction No. 134/1996, developers who could not build the facilities could pay compensation to the administration. This would be used to build low-cost apartments.
"But in reality the developers are reluctant to pay the compensation as well," he said.
He calculated that if the land price of the 1.8 million square meters of facilities which the developers owed was set at Rp 200,000 (US$75.4) per square meter, the financial losses borne by the city reached about Rp 360 billion.
Upto last June the municipality had issued 2,070 land permits for developers, of which only 1,883 are still active. The remainder are no longer effective because their owners have declared bankruptcy.
The data show that only 26 land permitholders have fulfilled their obligations.
At present, Saud said, the municipality was still issuing new permits for developers even though many still declined to comply with the regulations.
"I don't understand why this is so. The municipality should collect the city's assets first," Saud said. (ste)