Discipline for all levels

In this 50th anniversary year of Merdeka (independence), President Soeharto has launched the National Discipline Movement.

I saw the advanced forces of this movement in action recently in my suburb of Kebayoran Baru, South Jakarta, and it was not a pretty sight. It appears the movement is directed only at the poor and powerless and is to be enforced with all the arrogance, violence and bullying that characterize local government intervention.

The New Year holiday peace of our normally quite street was rudely shattered at nine a.m. by a convoy of vehicles consisting of a leading van, with a loudspeaker, which decanted several officials in orange vests bearing the slogan of the movement; a truck full of police; two trucks of yellow-overalled peons to do the dirty work; and a follow-up van with a loudspeaker to reinforce the message.

The object of this overkill was a small number of warung (stalls) operating on the corner of the street opposite my house. A family group who live on the site and run a totally inoffensive and obviously very popular service for local workers. The government team came without warning and proceeded to smash, chop and destroy structures which the family had erected, including a kamar mandi (bath room), which they used to keep their small children spotlessly clean, chop down trees and harangue the people through the two loudspeaker vans. The family were running around like ants caught under a huge foot, terrified of losing their livelihood and desperate to cooperate.

While I applaud the authorities' desire to encourage hygiene and order in the community, I deplore the presumption that only the lower levels of the community offend in this area, particularly as in this very street there are several vulgarly ostentatious "palaces" which offend my eye and sense of propriety far more than do the warung, whose occupants are at least trying to make an honest living.

I also find it grossly offensive that these decent people should be subject to such aggressively bullying tactics, when education, help and persuasion would be a more appropriate and humane way of tackling the problem.

MRS NANCY HANSON

Jakarta