`Growth of cities depend on political power'

`Growth of cities depend on political power'

JAKARTA (JP): A scholar said that the boom of Indonesian
cities, particularly Jakarta whose population is estimated to
reach 30 million over the next 25 years, is closely related to
the distribution of political power.

"In Indonesia, cities usually become a center of commerce,
industry, education, art and culture because of the their initial
status as a center of administrative power," said Sarlito Wirawan
Sarwono, a noted scholar from the Jakarta-based University of
Indonesia, at a two-day seminar beginning here yesterday.

Citing an example, Sarlito told the seminar, under the theme
Cities Booming in Indonesia that Jakarta was able to grow into
its current huge size because of its status as a center of
political power and decision making process.

In other countries such as North America where administrative
and political power is not highly centralized, many urban centers
grow along with the development of cities into centers of
industries and commerce, he added.

Suntara, the chairman of the Indonesian Society of Architects
(IAI), which organized the seminar, said in his opening address
that 50 percent of Indonesia's 240 million population in the year
2019 will live in urban areas.

"It's quite a boom," he said.

State Minister of Research and Technology B.J. Habibie,
another speaker at the seminar, however, questioned the
speculation of the boom.

"Isn't it possible for us to stop such a boom?" Habibie said,
adding that albeit the development of the cities' infrastructure,
villagers rarely survive in cities because they are not trained
to work in urban areas.

He said Indonesia should curb urbanization, a trend which has
been increasing over the last three decades, by developing small
scale, high-tech enterprises in villages.

"We cannot rely on traditional agriculture due to its limited
value added," he said, citing the success of small scale
enterprises developed in Taiwan.

"If my job allows me, I would like to stay in a village rather
than here in Jakarta," the technology czar said, adding that a
village life is environmentally better than a metropolis one.

As if trying to convince the audience, he affectionately told
a story about his childhood period at Pare-pare, a small village
in South Sulawesi, in which he could swim in the clean river and
play with his horse in the meadow.

Sarlito said that the alternative to spreading the growth of
Indonesian cities is to decentralize the distribution of power
and the decision making process.

As if trying to prove his point, Sarlito challenged, "If the
development of the eastern part of Indonesia is considered to be
the most important part of national development, we can easily do
it by removing the capital from Jakarta to one of its cities."

Suntara called on architects and planners attending the
seminar to work together with sociologists, economists and
anthropologists to cope with the high rate of urbanization.(09)