Regent escapes through back door

Regent escapes through back door

BOGOR: Bogor Regent Agus Utara Efendi slipped out the back
door of the local council building on Friday to avoid hundreds of
Parung market vendors protesting plans to evict them to make way
for the construction of a shopping mall.

The regent was attending a meeting to endorse 11 new bylaws
when the traders, most of them women, arrived at the building.

Aware that the regent was in the building, the protesters
requested a meeting with him.

When the meeting ended, however, the regent slipped out of the
room and left the building through the back door. Dozens of women
attempted in vain to stop him, and several threw mineral water
bottles at his departing car.

The head of the Parung traders communication forum, Mad Husen,
said the vendors had repeatedly asked the council and the regency
administration to delay the construction of the Parung Indah Mall
until 2007.

Neneng, 39, who sells clothes at Parung market, said the
vendors wanted the construction to be postponed because they did
not have the money to buy kiosks at the new mall, which would
cost millions of rupiah each.--JP