LBH Jakarta condemns purchase of gas pistols

JAKARTA (JP): The Jakarta Legal Aid Institute (LBH Jakarta) on Wednesday condemned the purchase of 60 gas pistols to be used by city public order and civil defense officials.

Head of LBH Jakarta's City and Urban Society, Tubagus Haryo Karbyanto, said the move showed that the city administration affairs are still dominated by a militaristic approach.

"Equipping the city officials with gas pistols will only add to the already existing violent culture, which is often a feature of crackdown operations held by the city public order office," Karbyanto said in a statement, copies of which were made available to the press.

"The city administration then must accept legal and moral responsibility if any misuse of the gas pistols occurs," he added.

Instead, Karbyanto suggested that the budget for the gas pistols purchase be used for other programs, such as for supporting the homeless who were captured during the operations.

Karbyanto was commenting on the purchase of 60 pistols which will be used by city officials during operations to restore order.

Karbyanto's statement was supported by Deputy chief of Tangerang Police Comm. Ricky F. Wakano.

"There is no legal basis for the city public order and civil defense officials to uphold the law by shooting at people.

"The city officials may misuse the gas pistols during physical contact with the crowd," Ricky said.

Yet, the city administration's move has won the support of Jakarta police chief Insp. Gen. Mulyono Sulaiman.

"The police support the idea, but only to the extent of arming top public order officials. The police and city administration is in the process of discussing this matter seriously," Mulyono told reporters at city police headquarters.

Councillor Abdul Azis Matnur of the Justice Party (PK) faction also said that he supported the move to equip the public order and civil defense officials with gas pistols due to the worsening security conditions in the capital.

"In reality, the city needs at least 216 gas pistols which will are to be given to chiefs of the operational units," Abdul said.

He, however, questioned the city public order office's move to procure 60 gas pistols, instead of 30 as already recommended by the city council.

"We (city council) only approved the purchase of 30 gas pistols with a total budget of Rp 900 million (US$94,736) as part of the project to upgrade the city officials' equipment, as stated in development expenditure of the 2001 city budget," Abdul, a councillor of the council's Commission A on government affairs, said.

He questioned how the city administration could cover the remaining Rp 300 million needed to purchase the pistols and why they had yet to inform the city council about the changes to the 2001 city budget.

"They are not transparent," said Abdul, while citing that the project cost Rp 2.23 billion, including the purchase of 102 walkie-talkies, 220 protection shields and 220 helmets.

The City Public Order office has spent Rp 1.2 billion to purchase 60 gas pistols for self defense in case of attacks during operations to restore order.

Each gas pistol, which has an effective shooting range of up to 10 meters and weighs 660 grams with the magazine capacity of seven bullets, can paralyze a person for 10 minutes due to its anesthetic effect.

The .9 millimeter caliber German-made Melcher pistol, with a 100 mm barrel, costs Rp 20 million, including the training and license fees provided by the National Police headquarters. (07/ylt)