Expatriates do their best to ward of crime

By Mehru Jaffer

JAKARTA (JP): Only yesterday, upmarket residential areas like Pondok Indah were considered a paradise to live in. Today, more and more houses in this paradise are giving way to apartments. Residents reigned from sprawling homes equipped with modern amenities while lush tropical greenery engulfed them in complete privacy. Yet all this poetically peaceful lifestyle is now being exchanged for the prosaic but surely more secure life of apartment buildings and housing complexes.

As law and order deteriorates in the city and incidents of crime increase, more houses are expected to be abandoned and left garlanded with "for rent" signs. In January alone, a-crime-a-day was noted by a security coordination cell of a Jakarta-based international organization. The local police add that crime has risen by over 10 percent in the city.

All the remaining occupied houses look more like fortresses than homes these days, equipped as they are with high barbed wire fences that seem to reach up to the skies and search lights that can blind from kilometers away. Apart from several security guards, poles have also sprouted overnight around homes that are fitted with closed circuit television cameras and spot lights. Not to forget the different breeds of dogs that are seen snarling behind many an art nouveau gate.

In short, both visiting people and waiting for people to visit has become a most suspicious affair.

"I hate living in an apartment. But I suppose we are safer here," complained a Pakistani.

During last May's social unrest, she and her teenage son found themselves alone in a house in Pondok Indah. Her husband was traveling and she panicked when she was told that she would be evacuated to Singapore. However, remaining in a big house was also an uncomfortable thought.

Soon after the heat and dust settled in the city, she moved her family to the Hilton Residence. In all these years she had never felt the need for a mobile phone, but now she carries one just to keep in constant touch with family and friends.

A vice president of Citibank instead chose to install a US$8,000 alarm system in his sprawling South Jakarta home. Now he has panic buttons in each bedroom which the children have been instructed to press immediately upon seeing an intruder in the house.

"I do feel a little more safe with the alarm system," said the wife, who has also hired six security guards so that at any given time of the day or night she has at least two guards outside her home. And her strict instructions to the staff is not to entertain anyone, including friends and relatives, in the house.

Scores of palatial homes were built for the army of expatriates that trooped into the country mostly during the late 1980s and the early 1990s. Along with Singapore and Malaysia, Indonesia was part of the big boom region. Many expatriates were involved in the financial, banking and hospitality sectors in upper management positions and earned salaries ranging from US$10,000 up to $50,000 dollars per month, plus house allowances and other perks running into another couple of thousand dollars.

Then came the economic crisis in 1997, followed by social and political unrest when life for expatriates turned turtle. Many of them had to leave the country. The Jakarta-based International Community Activity Center (ICAC) had more than 1,200 members last year. That number has dwindled to a paid membership of just 500. Those who remain here have become more cautious about security.

In all his 11 years in Jakarta, Terry DeMaret, facilities manager at the Jakarta International School (JIS), never thought twice about visiting any part of town at any time of the day or night. Even the notorious Tanah Abang. Today he is not so confident. He is a little more cautious. He prefers not to drive through places like Tanah Abang.

"It is not for myself that I fear. I lived in very troubled parts of Africa," DeMaret said.

His constant concern is for the thousands of students and hundreds of staff members at JIS. During his eight years at the school where he is responsible for maintenance, engineering, housing and security, he recalls that the school has received three bomb threats. Luckily all of them turned out to be false alarms, but the last one that came early last year was taken most seriously.

The local authorities were informed immediately and within minutes both military and police bomb squads arrived. The entire school was evacuated.

The school has not felt the need to go in for hi-tech security solutions like television cameras or alarm systems, but the number of security guards has been increased and safety is further insured with the installation of new gates. A new assistant chief of security was recently hired, and all staff members, parents and senior students are required to wear identification badges when on campus. DeMaret also periodically circulates memorandums to all parties involved with the school, giving simple but often forgotten tips regarding residential security.

He has advised that all household help are told not to entertain strangers, to keep all gates and doors locked when not in use and to never leave the house vacant unless specifically instructed by the employer. The school also stays in constant touch with local radio stations, the military, local police stations and a good source of information for trouble on the streets is the Blue Bird bus service that transports students across the length and breadth of the city.

"Sure, the current rise in criminality in the country is worrying. But it is not just foreigners who are affected. Everyone of us is in it together," DeMaret said.

It is mostly financial institutions like banks and commercial buildings that go in for state-of-the-art technology and loss prevention solutions. Most residents have simply increased the number of security guards in their homes, which keeps a lot of ex-Army people on their toes. Dozens of retired soldiers have started foundations to train young men to become security guards. Like Pak Suwardi, an ex-military man trained in security and telecommunications, is now employed by JIS. Pak Edi, too, runs a similar business and is reluctant to give further information about his set up except to say that many ex-soldiers are involved in providing security services today.

However, the worst thing to have happened in recent times in the city is the breakdown in trust between one human being and another. Expatriates Monica and Arvind try very hard not to judge all Indonesians by a recent experience. When they arrived home after their end-of-the-year holiday last January, they discovered that their trusted driver had vanished with their car. All attempts to trace the driver have failed and today Monica prefers to drive herself.

"I doubt I'll want to hire a driver for a long time," said the marketing executive with a textile company.