Jakarta's poor still line up for cash aid

Jakarta's poor still line up for cash aid

Damar Harsanto, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

The Jakarta office of the Central Statistics Agency (BPS Jakarta)
has registered over 28,000 new families that may be eligible to
benefit from the government's cash assistance program.

BPS Jakarta director Sunari Sarwono said over the weekend that his
office would carry out door-to-door checks on 28,130 families to
determine whether or not they were entitled to receive the cash
assistance as they claimed.

"Only those who satisfy the set criteria will receive the cash
payments," Sunari told reporters.

To ease the impact of last October's fuel price increases, the
government introduced the cash-assistance scheme, under which
poor families are entitled to receive Rp 100,000 (US$10.20) per
month for a period of one year.

The government has set 14 criteria to be used as yardsticks in
assessing whether a household is considered poor or not,
including having a dirt floor in the house, only one meal per
day, new clothes only once a year, no permanent job, and maximum
spending on health services and education. If a family satisfies
at least eight of the criteria, it will be entitled to receive
the payments.

The government initially allocated sufficient money to pay 15
million people across the country, but the number of people
claiming to be poor has continued to rise since the first
disbursement was made last October.

Violent, in some cases even bloody, protests have often
accompanied the disbursement of the assistance, prompting the
government to reopen registration.

In Jakarta, some 101,000 families were initially slated to
receive the assistance, but the number has continued to rise
since the first day of disbursement.

It is not immediately clear where the government will get the
money to pay those registering late as the House of
Representatives (DPR) earmarked only enough money to pay 15
million people.

Sunari said his 250 strong force would verify the information
supplied by the 28,000 newly registered families to determine
whether or not they were eligible for the assistance. He said he
hoped the verification process would be completed by Nov. 20.

"We hope we can start distributing Fuel Compensation Cards to
those who are eligible early in December so that they can receive
their money by the end of December," he said.

BPS Jakarta, in cooperation with command posts established by
Coordinating Minister for People's Welfare Alwi Shihab at the
subdistrict level, launched an additional registration drive
following complaints that it had missed tens of thousands of poor
families during the first registration drive.

Over the weekend, Councillor Hizbiyah Rochim lamented the fact
that BPS Jakarta had missed tens of thousands of poor families
during the first round, thus depriving them of the assistance
payments.

"We would advise the city administration to involve
neighborhood unit heads as these know the circumstances of the
people living around them better than officials from the BPS
Jakarta," Hizbiyah said.