Enjoy Jakarta?

Historian Ridwan Saidi claimed the anniversary of Jakarta did not fall on June 22. The native Jakartan said the date now commonly accepted as the day Jakarta was founded was actually the date when Fatahillah, or Faletehan, attacked Jakarta on the orders of king Cirebon in the early 16th century.

With respect to history, what Jakartans really need is not the date on which the city was founded. Residents need to see that the administration is doing something to make Jakarta a more livable city.

The anniversary of the capital is marked each year with an event called the Jakarta Fair. Unfortunately, this expensive fair has become little more than a mask to hide the failure of successive administrations to make Jakarta a better city for its residents.

Abraham Lincoln once said, "I am a slow walker, but I never walk back." Those involved in managing Jakarta are more than slow walkers; they seem to be reluctant to walk at all.

The result is that from year to year, residents can see little if any progress in all aspects of public service.

In terms of democracy, Jakarta, which is generally held up as an example and the barometer for other cities in the country, has made absolutely no progress. As a province, Jakarta, which has six municipalities, does not have a single legislative body at the municipal level. The absence of such local legislative bodies has made it impossible for residents to elect their mayors directly. The governor wields the power to appoint mayors, who will naturally feel that their loyalty and responsibility lies more with the governor than with residents.

Public services remain another area of concern. A recent survey by the Indonesian Institute for Civil Society, in cooperation with the European Union and the Partnership for Governance Reform in Indonesia, found that the level of public service in the city depended on how much residents could pay. The majority of survey respondents, interviewed in 80 subdistricts throughout the capital, said the response of officials to their needs depended on how much money they could give the officials. No one has denied the results of the survey.

Residents' demands for improved employment opportunities, security, public transportation and flood and pollution control have received little more than lip service from the administration.

The administration seems to be helpless to deal with rising unemployment. The answer is not to build more shopping malls, which mainly creates jobs for poorly educated construction workers and shopkeepers.

Crime remains a major concern in the city. The large number of illegal gambling establishments in Jakarta raises serious questions about law enforcement here. Every large rainstorm leaves residents worried about flooding, a sign of the administration's failure to establish an effective flood control system.

Jakarta, with at least 2.5 million private cars, 3.8 million motorcycles and 255,000 public transportation vehicles on the roads, is the world's third most polluted city after Bangkok and Mexico City. As the skies grow dirtier and dirtier, residents are left to wonder about officials' commitment to cleaning up the air.

The only effort of note to improve public transportation is the administration's introduction of the busway, which continues to attract more passengers. TransJakarta buses have become the only alternative for those who want to spend less time getting to and from work. However, because it covers such a limited area, the "success" of the busway does not reflect any true success in moving people around the capital. What the densely populated city really needs is a mass rapid transit (MRT) system.

On the streets, poor traffic enforcement encourages motorists to violate traffic regulations, endangering themselves and everyone else on the roads. Motorcyclists behave like ghosts, floating through traffic lights as if they did not even exist.

Jakarta cannot overcome the enormous challenges it faces without help from the neighboring provinces of West Java and Banten. The garbage dump dispute between Jakarta and West Java is a recent example of this need to work together.

With migrants continuing to pour into Jakarta, unchecked urbanization is often cited as a major factor in many of the capital's woes. The only remedy is regional autonomy, which empowers provinces to create jobs for their residents. It is hoped that more job opportunities in other provinces will stop people from pouring into Jakarta looking for work. From this it is clear that "mending" Jakarta is a national issue.

Given the complexity of the problems, it would be natural for people to assume that Jakarta will only grow worse; or, at the very least, that no significant improvements will be seen. Every plan to make Jakarta a more livable city seems to die on the vine. And the older Jakarta gets, the worse and more complex its problems.

Therefore, as we mark the 478th anniversary of Jakarta, Governor Sutiyoso should take heed of something Charles Dickens wrote in A Tale of Two Cities: "I am like one who died young, all my life might have been."