City official defends parking joint venture

City official defends parking joint venture

JAKARTA (JP): A top city official has came to the defense of a
controversial joint car parking venture between a local company
and an Australian firm.

"Such a joint venture is just alright because there is no law
explicitly banning a foreign company from such a business," the
assistant to the City Secretary of Economic and Development
Affairs, Prawoto, said Wednesday.

"But both firms are obliged to hand over 25 percent of their
gross income collected from parking lots to BP Parkir, the city
parking authority."

He was responding to sharp criticism of the city
administration for allowing Australia's Secure Parking to manage
parking services around luxury city buildings in cooperation with
PT Securindo Packatama.

The Indonesian Consumers Foundation (YLKI) blasted the policy
saying local companies could manage the city's parking services
just as well.

"It's difficult to understand why the city administration and
owners of luxury buildings appeared to trust a foreign firm more
than a local one in matters regarding parking management," YLKI
executive chairwoman Tini Hadad said.

She said this served only to further breed the false notion in
certain quarters that "everything from overseas, especially from
developed countries, is better."

"Such a wrong attitude could eventually impair our campaigns
to encourage people to use and love domestic products," Tini
said.

A city councilor supported the YLKI's stand.

"The parking joint venture runs counter to the spirit
contained in the city ruling No. 7/87, as well as the governor's
decree No 1538/92 that, among other things, regulate procedures
regarding the employment of foreigners," said Djenny Suharso from
the Indonesian Democratic Party (PDI) faction.

He said the city's parking management procedures should be
based on these rulings.

But Prawoto said the city administration gave the go-ahead to
the Australian company because Indonesia still lagged behind
advanced countries in the legal aspects of certain public
services.

"We should not turn a blind eye to this," he said.

He hoped the company could work more professionally in
managing parking services, especially since it was using a high-
tech system that could ensure more accurate data on the number of
cars parked. "And in turn this could generate more revenue from
the parking sector."

TB M. Rais, the deputy governor for economic and development
affairs, was quoted by the Jayakarta daily as saying the joint
venture could improve the city's parking management and increase
city revenue.

Parwoto said the city's parking revenues had been decreasing
over the past three years, mostly because many corrupt parking
attendants repeatedly gave the same tickets to motorists at the
expense of BP Parkir.

"Such practice should be stopped once and for all. Other city
revenue office will never be able to reach the revenue target
from the public sector," he said. (bas)