Care Forum unsure of its responsibilities

Care Forum unsure of its responsibilities

M. Taufiqurrahman, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

It has been over a month since the city administration
established the Jakarta Care Forum to help solve some of the
city's problems, but its members admit that they have made no
progress and are still unsure about what they are supposed to be
doing.

Saparinah Sadli, a social psychologist and one of the forum
members, said the city administration had provided very little
information about the forum's authority or how their suggestions
would be used by the city administration.

"As long as these issues are not resolved, I doubt the forum
will be of any use," she told The Jakarta Post, last weekend.

She also said since the establishment of the forum, its
members had not held a meeting to discuss the city's problems.

Consisting of experts from a variety of disciplines, the
Jakarta Care Forum was set up by the city administration early
last month to help the administration get a handle on some of the
urban problems here.

The administration has long been criticized for the way it
deals with problems, such as forcibly evicting the poor from
their homes and businesses along riverbanks.

Besides Saparinah, some of the experts included in the forum
are Ali Wongso (former city councillor), Arief Rahman (educator),
Hermawan Kartajaya (marketing expert) and M. Ronny Nitibaskara
(criminologist).

Saparinah went even further by saying that she did not regard
herself as being part of the forum.

"As far as I know, Governor Sutiyoso just announced the
formation of the forum after a meeting in which experts were
asked to give opinions about a number of problems in the city,"
she said.

She said a number of concerned experts had sent a letter to
the city administration offering suggestions on what form the
forum should take.

"But there has been no answer so far," she said.

Contacted separately, another member of the forum, Arief, said
the forum had a long way to go before it could operate
effectively.

"Because of problems in the city administration, suggestions
from experts in the forum would be changed for the worse before
they could be implemented.

"And there is no information about who will put the experts'
suggestions into action or where the money will come from to
implement (the suggestions)," Arief told the Post.

Arief said the city administration needed to overhaul the
bureaucracy before it could begin a reform based on suggestions
from the forum members.

He added that the forum members had not yet been provided an
office at City Hall from which they could work.

"Until now, members of the forum work individually. But in the
near future we will sit down together and discuss the city's
problems," he said, adding that the meeting would take place in
the next one or two weeks.

He underlined that members of the forum were not personal
advisers to Governor Sutiyoso. "This is only an attempt to
involve citizens in deciding what is best for the city."