Peace settlement for a price

Peace settlement for a price

It was well after 10 p.m., on Aug. 30. As I approached the
nearly deserted Senayan traffic circle from the Ratu Plaza area,
two buses overtook me from the slow lane on my left. To let them
through, I moved over to the right side of the street. But just
as I was to enter Jl. Sisingamangaraja, a police sergeant major
signaled me to pull over.

"You're trespassing on the road line," he said, and asked to
see my driver's license. I protested that there was no road
demarcation and I was not breaking any rule. He kept insisting
there was a road line, but did not show which one he meant.

Instinctively I sensed his ultimate goal -- to squeeze money
through a "peace settlement " bargain, a routine "street
tradition" so notorious to drivers all over Jakarta (perhaps
Indonesia?). They are more on the lookout for driving errors than
regulating traffic, the adage goes.

As a fresh university graduate, I realized I was even more
broke than the person before me. Assuming eventually that I had
nothing to offer, he became more "businesslike". A tilang-ticket
(ticket) was issued, and I will have to appear in court. How many
such encounters, I wondered, will there be?

Predictably, the seat belt requirement will eventually
"create" venues of "peace settlement" and any corruptive deed
whatsoever. There will also be a substantial burden on owners of
old cars manufactured without seat belts. How much will they have
to pay out in this economic calamity for the advantage of a small
segment of red-tape sponsored merchants?

Given the number of vehicles in Jakarta, any speeding is out
of the question. The streets are more jammed than flowing.
Presumably, this seat belt thing is implementable only for
highways and long distance driving.

I call on our legislators to pay attention to these matters.
They are supposed to be stamping out the corruptive mind and ill-
deeds derived from this seat belt issue or from any traffic
encounter. Above all, they should clear the streets from "illegal
levy hunting" individuals and institutions.

V.S. SONNY FAAH

Jakarta