City Council upsets Melawai traders

City Council upsets Melawai traders

JAKARTA (JP): Around 300 small-scale traders of the Melawai
marketplace in the Blok M terminal shopping center once again
marched to the City Council yesterday to protest the Matahari
Department Store's ongoing construction of two escalators for the
building.

Several representatives of the protesters, led by Dasril, were
received for a hearing by members of the city's Commission B,
which oversees trade affairs. But the hearing failed to yield the
positive results expected by the traders as their demands
appeared to fall on deaf ears on the part of the councilors.

A fistfight nearly resulted between Dasril and Councilor Hotma
Tambunan from the Armed Forces faction.

Hotma made a remark that angered Dasril, who immediately got
up from his chair. Clenching his fist, the obviously angry Dasril
challenged the councilor to a fight, saying: "Mr. Councilor we'd
better go outside to settle this."

But nothing untoward happened, thanks to fellow protesters who
managed to restrain Dasril from making further aggressive actions
that could have exasperated the already tense situation.

"We are very upset with the responses of the councilors. If
they are not willing to fight for us, we will go to the House of
Representatives," Dasril said. "This is the third time in less
than one month that we have staged a protest here. Unfortunately
each time our demands have been ignored."

The protesters strongly oppose the construction of the
escalators as they will only take customers to the second and
third floors of the building which is rented by Matahari. They
claimed that the escalators might prevent shoppers from buying
goods displayed by the small-scale traders on the first floor and
in the basement of the building.

Matahari is constructing the escalators with the intention of
providing customers greater access to the department store.

Zarkasy Marzuki, who presided over the hearing, said the
commission will hold further discussions on the case with the
city-owned PD Pasar Jaya firm which manages the marketplace.

After the hearing, the traders moved on to the adjacent city
hall, where they failed in their efforts to meet Governor Surjadi
Soedirdja.

"We want the governor to settle the case. Otherwise, we will
be forced to resort to violence," threatened Dasril. (jsk)