Court slaps asset preservation order on Tanah Abang market

Court slaps asset preservation order on Tanah Abang market

The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

The Central Jakarta District Court issued on Thursday an asset
preservation order on Tanah Abang textile market blocks B, C, D
and E, and refused to revoke the traders' permits, meaning they
can continue doing business in the market.

The court bailiff, Suharto, issued the order based on the
court head's ruling No. 20/2004.Del/PN.JKT.PST. The issuance
means city-run market operator PD Pasar Jaya cannot renovate,
tear down or sell the market to other parties.

"It also means traders can still continue doing business in
the market," said the traders' lawyer Juniver Girsang.

However, traders are not allowed to tear down the partitions
built by PD Pasar Jaya.

Juniver said traders would be fined or imprisoned if they
acted in an unauthorized manner. He added that the decision would
be valid until a final decision was made by the court.

Traders had filed a complaint against PD Pasar Jaya through
the West Jakarta District Court on Nov. 22. The court head issued
the asset preservation order against the market's land and
buildings.

However, since the market is located in Central Jakarta, the
West Jakarta court requested that the Central Jakarta court
execute the order.

PD Pasar Jaya made its final decision in August to renovate
Tanah Abang market's four blocks, following a recommendation from
the Bandung Institute of Technology (ITB)'s School of Civil
Engineering that said the building would collapse within two
years due to grave structural weakness.

The ITB team of experts recommended in June the demolition of
the largest textile market in Southeast Asia, because the
buildings, constructed in the 1970s, could no longer support
activities there.

As a result, PD Pasar Jaya and the traders agreed to appoint
the University of Indonesia (UI) to conduct another study for a
second opinion. Later, PD Pasar president director Prabowo
Soenirman stressed that any second opinion would not affect the
original plan to demolish the market and replace it with a modern
shopping mall.

He announced that the demolition of the market would take
place in January despite strong continued protest from the
traders.