Jakarta enjoys firecracker-free Ramadhan

Tertiani ZB Simanjuntak, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

What is missing that has made the Ramadhan fasting month so quiet this year? It is the loud bang of firecrackers which are usually set off all night after the breaking of the fast at around 6 p.m. up to the predawn meal time at 4 a.m. in the morning.

With a year-long campaign and raids against the trading and use of firecrackers all over the city, the police took all the credit for the peaceful month and refused to say that it could also be attributable to trauma as a result of the Bali bombing tragedy.

Jakarta Police deputy spokesman Comr. Alex Mandalika claimed on Tuesday that it was the force's antifirecrackers program -- which was intensified in late October under an operation called Cipta Kondisi -- that has made the city free of the harmful, loud and annoying sound of firecrackers.

"We created 155 types of slogans against firecrackers and put them up around the city, while the unit for community education and guidelines propagated the information to local administrations, religious leaders and prominent figures in the community that trading and using firecrackers was a crime," he told reporters.

Such slogans were of various styles, from the harmless "Gue kate ape, petasan itu berbahaya" (Betawi dialect for: I told you, firecrackers are dangerous); "Fasting, Yes. Firecrackers, No"; to the more threatening, "The trading and use of firecrackers is a violation of Emergency Law No. 12/1951 on possession of explosives".

The emergency law carries a maximum 20-year prison sentence.

In addition, those who are found producing, selling or buying firecrackers will be charged under Article 187 of the Criminal Code on explosives, which carries a maximum eight-year prison sentence.

Besides the campaign, the police also cut off the distribution link from major producers in Parung and Tangerang, both under West Java Police jurisdiction, said Mandalika.

"In the firecracker operation, we coordinated with the West Java Police. We have tackled the firecracker problem at its roots. That is why there are no firecrackers in the city, and not because people feel traumatized by explosions," he said.

Although he could not cite the precise number, Mandalika claimed that this year's raids had resulted in a larger number of confiscated firecrackers than last year's.

Central Jakarta Police alone confiscated 136,933 firecrackers in a string of raids since March. Last year, in a three-day raid a total of 1.4 million firecrackers were seized from across the city.

Jakarta, and other cities in the country, have been haunted by bomb hoaxes and scares especially after the Oct. 12 bombings in Bali.

Firecrackers have also been responsible for traumatizing residents. Last year, a workshop of a firecracker manufacturer in Duri Kepa, West Jakarta, along with three neighboring houses, were destroyed in a explosion caused by unstable explosive- material. Three people were injured, including the owner of the workshop.

The latest case was a blast at a firecracker factory in Kalibakung village, Tegal, Central Java, last September. Ten employees were killed, while 17 others were severely injured.

With the full support of the Jakarta administration, the police pledged last year they would be firm in enforcing a ban on trading and using firecrackers in Jakarta, a traditional feature of the festive season for the local Betawi people.

But up to now, none of the producers, distributors, vendors or users have been sent to court.

Several vendors have decided against selling firecrackers, although in the past they usually hid the more popular merchandise behind harmless sparklers to avoid police raids.

"No, I lost a fortune. All of them were confiscated," Roy, a firecracker vendor in Tanah Abang, Central Jakarta, told The Jakarta Post on Tuesday.

One thing the police forget is that firecrackers can be made at home as the materials are easily obtainable and many residents know how to make them themselves.

"My neighbors plan to set off all the firecrackers they have on the eve of Idul Fitri. Just wait and see," Teguh, a resident of Ciledug, an area bordering South Jakarta and Tangerang, told the Post.