City sees no progress on monorail project
Damar Harsanto, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta
With no significant progress made after six months of work, the Jakarta administration has called on investors to take the monorail project more seriously.
"The investors have the obligation to proceed with its development ... Governor Sutiyoso has done his bit by giving his assurance through a Memorandum of Understanding," Deputy governor Fauzi Bowo said at City Hall.
Fauzi was asked to comment on the press statement made by the consortium of developers, PT Jakarta Monorail, saying that the investors, mostly foreign, were awaiting a gubernatorial decree to make some plots of land required in the master plan available.
PT Jakarta also said that investors were hesitant to disburse money for the US$650-million project for, among other reasons, security concerns.
"It will take some time to acquire private or state land that will be affected by the project," Fauzi said. "In the meantime, investors should go ahead with what they're supposed to do."
Meanwhile, Sutiyoso said that the consortium should have come to him to straighten things out.
"I met with (members of) the consortium on Wednesday for clarification over the monorail project, which will affect the softball field in the Bung Karno Sports Complex, but they gave me the impression that everything was going just fine," he said.
Executives with PT Jakarta Monorail could not immediately be reached for comment on Friday.
The Jakarta Post did not observe any significant construction work on Jl. Asia Afrika, Central Jakarta, on Friday. The pylons for the project were set in the ground soon after the groundbreaking ceremony officiated by Megawati Soekarnoputri on June 14.
The project has been on-again, off-again for a while, due to some flaws in the master plan, which also seems to be subject to change.
The plan is that the monorail depot will be over the West Flood Canal in Tanah Abang, Central Jakarta, which is managed by state railway company PT KAI.
Besides the softball field, the railway lines will cut through the canal's banks, the maintenance of which is taken care of by the Ministry of Public Works. The Bung Karno Sports Complex is managed by the State Secretary.