Council criticizes proposed budget

Council criticizes proposed budget

Novan Iman Santosa, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

The City Council urged the Jakarta administration on Thursday to
be more efficient and prudent in drafting the 2003 City Budget as
there was a lot of overlapping and unnecessary items included in
the draft budget.

Councillors made their criticisms during a plenary meeting
when individual factions gave their overall responses to the
draft budget.

Earlier on Monday, Governor Sutiyoso presented the proposed
budget of Rp 11.05 trillion to be funded by city revenue of Rp
8.89 trillion and another Rp 2.2 trillion in unspent funds left
over from the 2002 budget, which amounted to Rp 9.7 trillion.

Critics had rebuked the governor for increasing the budget
even though more than 22 percent of last year's budget was left
unspent, which indicated the administration's poor planing and
failure to implement the projects properly.

In response to Sutiyoso's budget proposal, the Justice Party
(PK) faction, questioned two separate projects to provide
computerized, on-line mailing systems for the governor costing Rp
99 million and Rp 100 million respectively.

"There are also similarities in legal education projects with
each costing Rp 200 million," PK faction spokesman Abdul Aziz
Matnur said.

Similar possible duplication was also revealed by Tubagus
Abbas Saleh Ma'mun of the Nation Awakening Party (PKB) faction,
pointing to expenditures on land capital.

"There are two items for land capital expenditure with the
same 2.3.01.01 code but with different values in the draft.

"The first item is worth some Rp 13 billion and the other
costs more than Rp 436 billion," he added.

Abbas said that such duplication showed that the executive
branch still had to improve its administration capabilities.

The councillors not only questioned possible duplications,
indicating either typographical mistakes or intended mark-ups,
but also questioned the importance of several items in the draft
budget.

The PK faction, for example, questioned the importance of the
City Transportation Agency acquiring new Harley-Davidson
motorcycles costing more than Rp 3.5 billion when the agency
could simply acquire other makes of bike that were cheaper.

The faction also pointed to the trend among city agencies of
acquiring computers at a cost of more than Rp 1 billion for each
agency.

"The City Population Agency proposes an unrealistic budget of
Rp 1.5 billion for new computers," said Aziz.

The Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI Perjuangan)
faction condemned to the City Public Works Agency for its
proposed waste water treatment plants to be built in Mayestik,
South Jakarta, and Cengkareng, West Jakarta, at a cost of Rp 1.5
billion each.

"The scope of those projects is limited to the municipality
level, so why was it the city agency who proposed the plants?
they should have been proposed by the respective municipality
public works offices instead," said faction spokesman Ajarta
Sebayang.

It was feared that the municipalities would later propose
similar projects even though the factions did not specifically
say this.

Meanwhile, the Crescent and Star Party (PBB) faction
spokesman, Syarifien Maloko, questioned the fact that the City
Public Order Agency received increased budgets from year to year
without any concrete results.

"Traditional markets and our streets are still congested due
to the presence of so many street vendors. They also build their
stalls on the sidewalks denying pedestrians the right of way."

While focusing their responses on different subjects, all
factions agreed on one subject: that the city administration
should be able to generate more revenue from city-owned
companies.

The administration expects to receive Rp 67.23 billion this
year, which is considered far below the real potential of the
companies.

The United Development Party (PPP), for example, pointed to
market operator PD Pasar Jaya, which is expected to contribute Rp
3.5 billion to the city budget.

"The company should be able to contribute more given that it
has assets worth hundreds of billions of rupiah all over the
city," PPP faction spokesman HA Rahman said.