Glodok shopping bridge finally evacuated
Glodok shopping bridge finally evacuated
JAKARTA (JP): The authorities finally evacuated the Glodok Metro Bridge shopping strip yesterday, one week after a deadline imposed by the West Jakarta mayor.
The evacuation brought to a climax a prolonged dispute involving 60 shop owners, PT Binacitra Tataswati and the West Jakarta Mayoralty.
Police and military personnel were deployed yesterday to execute the instruction of West Jakarta mayor Sutardjianto to clear the city-owned shopping strip.
Shop owners looked tense even before security personnel arrived at about 11:00 a.m. Some had packed their goods and were already preparing to leave. The operation passed without incident.
When the police and military arrived they cordoned the compound and told shop owners and passersby to leave.
Some retailers have already left the shopping strip and are renting new shops in nearby Harco Plaza. Many of those still on the shopping strip were confused about what to do next before they finally packed their goods.
On Jan. 24 Sutardjianto gave shop owners one week to vacate their shops. According to the mayor, the instruction was given following the shop owners' failure to pay a lease based on a new contract set out by PT Binacitra, a private firm appointed by the government last September to manage the pedestrian shopping walkway.
Shop owners said the new lease was exorbitant. Newspapers have confusing figures on the lease offered by PT Binacitra. Some reports said that the firm asked Rp 20 million to Rp 22 million per square meter for a period of 20 years. Other reports said Rp 2 million per square meter over a period of three years pending confirmation of a triple level freeway construction connecting Kota and Cinere.
PT Binacitra director Supandi Gozali has never been available for comment. Staff at PT Binacitra always say that he is out visiting project sites. The company's lawyer O.C. Kaligis was also unavailable yesterday.
The West Jakarta mayor was not available for comment when contacted by the Post yesterday.
"The high lease is not the main reason why we are reluctant to trust PT Binacitra," a shop owner asking for anonymity told The Jakarta Post. "It is the vagueness of its identity that made us reluctant to do so."
However, city legislator Abdullah Abdulgani said last week that PT Binacitra is a legal company.
"So far, the executives have only claimed that PT Binacitra is a legally established firm," said Gunawan Tjahjadi, one of shop owners' lawyers.
For many shop owners the evacuation was a nightmare they had foreseen after being in limbo for weeks.
The shop owners filed two suits last week. One was addressed to the mayor and the other requesting cancellation of the appointment of PT Binacitra by city-owned PD Pasar Jaya.
Gunawan said he resented the government's action while their suits were still being processed. (14)