Council to propose draft bylaw on asset management

JAKARTA (JP): In a move to prevent losses of city assets, the City Council will soon submit a draft bylaw on city asset management, a councilor said on Monday.

"We find it necessary to submit and deliberate such a draft city bylaw because there is no regulation at all to regulate city asset management," councilor Amarullah Asbah of the Golkar Party faction announced at his office.

Amarullah, who is also chairman of Council Commission C for financial affairs, said that currently city assets were estimated to be worth more than Rp 67 trillion (US$893 million).

Data at the City Supplies Office shows that the estimated value includes more than 12,000 plots of land and the buildings on the plots.

"The value would be much higher if we were to include city assets which are in dispute with other parties. I estimate that it could reach Rp 200 trillion in total," Amarullah said.

"The draft bylaw, if enacted, will enable the City Supplies Office not only to register all city assets, but also to impose legal actions on any violating parties," he added.

The councilor said the proposal to deliberate the draft bylaw was not the first of its kind as he made a similar proposal in Sept. 1998, during the previous council term.

He told the council at the time that prevailing legal bases for controlling the management of properties were no longer adequate to protect the properties from unlawful use, which usually led to the ownership of the land being disputed.

"As the current legal bases cover only practical things, the planned bylaw is expected not only to regulate the properties' registration but also control usage," he said.

The bylaw is also expected to define the order of responsibility in the management of the properties, he said.

"I hope the bylaw will help reduce the number of properties misappropriated," he said.

Responsibility

Amarullah also told the council that the bylaw should stipulate that all city bureaucrats, ranging from subdistrict heads to the governor, must have knowledge of the properties' existence so that if there were violations in the management of any land it would be easier to discern who should be held responsible.

Amarullah cited an example of what happened to a plot on Jl. Budi Kemuliaan I in Central Jakarta when a portion of it was developed by Bank Indonesia (Central Bank).

"I heard that Bank Indonesia had sent a letter to the governor requesting that the 2,670-square-meter plot be made available for the project. But the governor never discussed the transfer of the land to Bank Indonesia with the City Council," he said, while suggesting that the city administration should ask for compensation from the central bank totaling Rp 40 billion.

Another case, he said, was a gas station on Jl. Sahardjo in South Jakarta, which was once managed by the Capital and Investment Management Board (BPIPM).

"I've been told that the board sold the 600-square-meter property to a third party without telling the authorities," he said.

"Such cases are proof of how important a city bylaw on city asset management is."

He said the bylaw would enable city councilors to keep track of city assets and to take legal action against those violating it.

"The bylaw will also expand the City Supplies Office into an agency capable of performing its duties with its new authority," he said. (05)