Building permits process still complicated

Building permits process still complicated

JAKARTA (JP): Chairman of the Indonesian Real Estate
Association Enggartiasto Lukito has expressed concern over the
arduous procedures involved to gain building permits for housing
projects in the city.

Speaking at a meeting between the association and officials of
the city administration on Wednesday night, Enggartiasto said
that the onerous procedures forced developers to spend a great
deal of time to get the permits and thereby caused construction
delays.

"Any delay causes developers to suffer financial losses and
one of the ways to speed up the processing of a permit is to
offer bribes to officials of the city administration," he said.

He said that the officials were not responsible for this
bribery because it was the developers who paid the money.
"However, the practice should not be tolerated," he said.

He urged the government to simplify the procedures for the
processing of building permits as a means of ending the
corruption.

Head of the City Development and Supervision Office, Soeharto
Prodjowijono, told the meeting that his office had no intention
of lengthening the process of issuing building permits. He
contended that is was the developers, themselves, who were
responsible for delays, he said.

"Many developers -- especially those concerned with public
facilities -- fail to fulfill all the requirements set by the
city administration for the issuance of the permits at the time
of submitting their proposals," Soeharto said.

"There are still many proposals piling up in my office,
submitted by developers who have not fulfilled the requirements,"
he said.

The requirement which developers most often failed to meet was
the provision of space for small-scale traders in shopping mall
projects, he said.

Soeharto was adamant that his office would not issue temporary
permits before the developers had fulfilled the requirements.

Soeharto criticized developers who refuse to be responsible
about the damage caused by their projects.

For example, he said, developers refused to clean the area
around their construction sites, polluted with dust and debris
from the building work, claiming it was outside their
responsibilities. Soeharto said that his office would be taking
stern action against such negligent developers. (yns)