Kenari market project to go ahead

JAKARTA (JP): City Market Authority, PD Pasar Jaya, intends to continue developing the Kenari market in Central Jakarta despite a dispute over the site with state-owned railway company PT Perumka.

A director of PT Pasar Jaya, Albert Napitupulu, said on Tuesday that the company's main concern was to accommodate the 100 traders who had lost their kiosks because of the redevelopment. He said the dispute over the site was secondary.

"We will start construction as soon as we obtain a development permit. The dispute is not our problem, it is being handled by the Central Jakarta mayoralty," Albert said.

He said it would take about one year to build the market.

The city administration and Perumka each claimed they owned the 7,000 square meter plot after a fire destroyed more than 100 kiosks in Kenari Market last July.

Albert said that, according to city documents, the 7,000 square meter plot on Jl. Salemba, Central Jakarta, was owned by PT Perumka before the plot was handed over to the city in 1966 by a government body, the People's Economic Board.

"Therefore it belongs to the administration. But it is none of our business. We are concentrating on developing the new market building," he said.

The chairman of city council Commission B for economic affairs, Sahala B. Sinaga, urged the city administration to be careful with the redevelopment.

"Don't let the traders fall victim to the dispute," he said.

Before the fire, 377 small-scale traders owned 452 kiosks at the market.

The dispute has delayed the project. In the meantime, traders are selling their wares in makeshift kiosks along Jl. Salemba Raya. (yns)