Cikokol traders banned from rebuilding kiosks

Cikokol traders banned from rebuilding kiosks

The Jakarta Post, Tangerang

The Tangerang municipal administration has prohibited hundreds of
merchants in the Cikokol traditional market, whose shops burned
down last week, from rebuilding their kiosks.

The city's legislative council is backing the administration's
stance, saying the mayor should enforce the ban.

The council said the market was located in an area the city
administration planned to turn into a "green zone".

"According to Bylaw No. 23/2000, the Cikokol area will be
turned into the city's lungs, or a green area. Therefore, there
can be no market there," Bambang Irawan, chairman of the
council's Commission B for market affairs, said on Friday.

He said the Cikokol vendors could move to two new markets
recently built by the government, located on Jl. Raya Sudirman in
Tanah Tinggi subdistrict and next to the Poris Plawad bus
terminal.

Bambang said the council would ask the administration to
provide the merchants will reasonably priced kiosks in the new
markets.

And the traders should be allowed to pay off their kiosks in
installments, he said.

Another Commission B member, Djamaludin, said the city
administration and the merchants should be made aware of their
respective rights in order to smooth efforts to resolve the
problem.

"The traders should get kiosks in a proper place that will not
disturb public order. The Cikokol market should never have been
opened. That is why they (the vendors) should be ready to be
relocated to other areas.

"If some of the merchants have bought plots of land in the
Cikokol market from local officials, please sue the (officials).
We will help settle the problem," he said.

A number of traders in the Cikokol market oppose the
administration's plan to relocate them to the two new markets,
unless they are given special facilities to allow them to afford
kiosks.

"We are ready to move to the Tanah Tinggi market or the Poris
Plawad market, but how can we afford to buy kiosks there in cash?
The city administration should give us credit," Solihin, one of
the traders, said.

Fire swept through the Cikokol market last week. Many of the
traders have speculated that it was deliberately set in order to
close down the market.