Coping with student brawls not easy: Police
Coping with student brawls not easy: Police
JAKARTA (JP): Police and teachers are still struggling to understand and curb student brawls in the capital.
Operations launched by police against students and the confiscation of their weapons have done little to stop the aggression.
"At least seven high school students have been killed in brawls this year," City Police Chief Maj. Gen. Dibyo Widodo said at a meeting with teachers and students yesterday.
"This is a serious problem but we still don't know how to deal with it," said Dibyo, looking for ideas and suggestion from the public.
"We, the police, only disperse those involved in brawls and, when necessary, make arrests," he said. "We work like a fire brigade."
City police recorded a total of 160 brawls involving junior and senior high schools students last year, when 10 students died, 22 were seriously wounded and 57 injured slightly.
The 1994 data revealed that 917 students were caught, of whom 795 were arrested.
The schools with the most trouble makers are located in South and Central Jakarta.
Data shows that most student brawls in the city take place on Saturdays.
"It's a gruesome condition and I can imagine the feelings of the parents whose kids were killed in these foolish brawls," said Dibyo, a father of two senior high school students.
"Every time I wake up in the morning, I keep on thinking and thinking how to reduce the number of brawls," he said.
Apart from searching students, police also stop busloads of students to prevent them from meeting students from other schools, which normally turns into a fight.
The South Jakarta police, with the support of local military personnel, have also set up special posts in trouble spots.
But few police efforts have been fruitful, said Dibyo.
Teachers
The teachers shared Dibyo's opinion, saying that it is not easy for them to stop juvenile delinquency.
Knowing that the police will search them at any time, students generally keep their weapons at nearby food stalls, said M.B. Samosir, deputy to the headmaster of SMA 4 PSKD in South Jakarta.
In some cases the students even use their belts as weapons.
Samosir told The Jakarta Post that their habit of watching brutal movies on TV has played a role in the students' behavior.
"Today's youths have a lot of energy but no place to release it," he said. "They therefore turn to fighting and chasing after each other with stones and whatever else."
Samosir also cited parental supervision and poor teacher welfare as likely causes.
"Some of the students go back to school in the evening to chat with friends because no one is at home," he said.
The meeting yesterday was organized by the City Traffic Police Directorate. It was attended by the city's senior police officers and dozens of high school teachers and students. (bsr)