Drug-dealing spots identified

Damar Harsanto, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

The Jakarta Narcotics Agency (BNP) declared on Tuesday several areas in the city as trouble spots where drug trafficking was rampant.

"These trouble spots need special handling in order to reduce drug trafficking there," BNP chairman Fauzi Bowo said at City Hall.

He named Duripulo subdistrict near Roxy electronics center in West Jakarta and Kampung Ambon subdistrict in Cengkareng district in West Jakarta as two of the areas where drug dealing was rampant.

Fauzi, who is also Jakarta deputy governor, said that his agency along with police's drug squad had identified one of the roots of drug trafficking problems in those areas as the high unemployment rate.

"Because most residents in those trouble spots are jobless, they are easy prey for drug rings who have unlimited funds to recruit them as drug pushers and dealers," he said.

"In the past, we know that Kampung Bali in Tanah Abang district in Central Jakarta was a troubled area, but since various parties have given a helping hand, the drug problem in the area has been reduced significantly, though, we still need to monitor the area," he said.

Fauzi also named Warakas in North Jakarta, Galur in Senen, Central Jakarta, and Kebon Kacang in Central Jakarta as troubled areas.

The involvement of residents in the drug network has made the crackdown on drug trafficking at those locations more complicated as residents tried to hide the business from law enforcers, he said.

"We need more comprehensive efforts involving various parties in those communities to solve the problem, including measures to provide jobs for the residents," he said.

The administration has so far selected 10 of 44 districts in the capital to receive more funds for antidrug programs in their communities.

The programs are chaired by district heads with police precinct chiefs as deputies.

He emphasized that efforts to combat drug trafficking had to involve the public, or they would fail.

There are an estimated 10,000 injecting drug users (IDUs) in the capital. Those drug users face a higher risk of contracting HIV by sharing used needles.

An official report showed that as of Dec. 31, 2004, the city had the highest recorded number of people living with HIV/AIDS at 2,505, or 45 percent of the 5,540 officially reported cases of HIV/AIDS nationwide.