Budget rises, services deteriorate
Budget rises, services deteriorate
Damar Harsanto, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta
Despite sharp budget increases, public services in the capital
have continued to crumble over the past few years, an urban
planning expert says.
The chairman of the Center for Metropolitan Studies at
Tarumanegara University in West Jakarta, Soerjono Herlambang,
said Governor Sutiyoso had clearly failed to improve public
services in the capital.
"There is a very strong impression that Sutiyoso's
administration has made no significant improvements, especially
in terms of day-to-day public services," Soerjono told The
Jakarta Post over the weekend.
He said that while the city enjoyed steady economic growth and
bigger budgets, residents continued to experience the same
problems, including fires, poverty, evictions, flooding and
unemployment.
Jakarta's budget hovered at Rp 3.38 trillion in 2000 before
skyrocketing to Rp 14 trillion in 2005.
Residents, however, have seen little evidence of this in the
services they receive. There were 772 fires in 2001, 1,083 in
2002, 888 in 2003 and 803 in 2004.
The number of poor households has risen from 101,674 in 2001
to 111,957 in 2004.
"Unemployment stood at 14.7 percent of the total population in
2004, from 12.08 percent in 2000.
"Such a wide gap between positive indicators in the city and
the level of services could only happen because the city
administration is still infested with mismanagement, inefficiency
and corruption. And I think we can easily pinpoint those three
problems in Sutiyoso's administration," Soerjono said.
He highlighted the ubiquitous presence of gangs that
controlled areas across the capital, threatening residents with
seeming impunity.
"Before the 1980s, those gangs only had a strong grip on city
centers like Senen, Tanah Abang, Glodok and Blok M. Now they have
spread to every corner of the city," he said.
The latest incident was a series of deadly clashes between
police officers and some 100 gang members who attacked the
marketing office of the Taman Permata Buana housing complex in
Kembangan, West Jakarta, last month.
A survey by non-governmental organization Indonesian Institute
for Civil Society (INCIS) earlier this year found that 22.2
percent of 480 respondents doubted Sutiyoso's ability to
eradicate red tape in the bureaucracy.
"Most of the respondents complained about rampant corruption,
especially at the subdistrict level, where officials often ask
for 'cigarette money' and 'transportation fees' for services they
give to people," said INCIS executive director Hasan Sadeli.
Sutiyoso, in a speech to civil servants on June 22, called on
his subordinates to "work much harder and to be more
professional".
"In response to demands by residents that the administration
eradicate corruption, collusion and nepotism, we will intensify
our monitoring and impose sterner sanctions against any civil
servants implicated in KKN," he said, using the local acronym for
corruption, collusion and nepotism.