City police gear up for next year's election

JAKARTA (JP): Jakarta Police will be busy with political demonstrations next year due to the general election scheduled for May, City Police Chief Maj. Gen. Hamami Nata has predicted.

Speaking Tuesday at the end-of-year press conference, Hamami said that the police forces are ready to anticipate such a possibility.

He called on the people to keep cool and alert because the political climate might be a little hotter before and after the election.

According to police records, there were 289 demonstrations this year, including 142 staged by workers, 62 by ordinary people (complaining about land disputes), 55 by students, 17 by mass organizations and 11 by political parties.

Hamami said that drug-related cases, armed robberies, and students brawls would also still be pivotal next year.

Cases relating to drugs, especially Ecstasy, would possibly boom next year, he said. "Drug criminals will join together into bigger groups." But he refused to call the groups as organized syndicates and said that the prediction was based on this year's trend and the fact that the business was very lucrative.

This year, Jakarta police arrested 37 people for possessing a total of 105,000 Ecstasy pills and 10 people for possessing 72.2 kilograms of dried marijuana. "All the people, including Ecstasy- suspect Zarina, and the evidence have been sent to the Prosecutors' Office."

Many Ecstasy smugglers and traffickers have been caught in Greater Jakarta. Some cases are handled by the City Police and some are handled by the National Police Headquarters. Therefore, the number of Ecstasy pills confiscated by the City Police is only 105,000 out of 255,485 pills seized by the National Police Headquarters.

Robberies

Hamami also predicted that armed robberies, especially against bank customers and taxi drivers, would still be high next year despite crackdowns on gun possession.

He said police have arrested 16 men and confiscated 12 guns in 27 armed robberies ."None of the guns belonged to the police."

Students brawls, which caused at least nine deaths this year would continue next year, he said. "We have handled 57 students brawls and arrested six students for killing other students."

The Jakarta Post recorded at least 15 students as being killed in separate brawls this year.

The number of crimes reported to the police declined by 15.5 percent to 16,756 cases this year from 19,827 cases last year, he said.

"It means a crime was committed in every 48 minutes and 38 seconds this year or seven minutes less than last year," he said.

He said police had shot dead 46 criminals for resisting arrests, saying that most of the criminals were former convicts. "Experience teaches us former convicts need special attention," he said.

The number of traffic accidents increased 21.6 percent to 1,364 accidents this year from 1,123 accidents last year, he said. "The number of people killed in traffic accidents increased this year to 563 from 462 last year."

He said this year's accidents caused Rp 1.69 billion in losses or 14.6 percent higher than that of last year.

On Tuesday morning, Hamami launched police operation Operasi Lilin (Operation Candlelight) to secure Christmas and New Year Eve celebrations.

He said a total of 11,306 officers, including from the military, are deployed to secure the year-end festivities. Ambulances, fire trucks and police dogs are also being deployed, he said. (jun)