Residents protest airport extortionists

TANGERANG (JP): Residents of Benda village, near the Soekarno- Hatta International Airport here, have demanded that the Tangerang authorities close a number of illegal travel agents on Jl. Husain Sastranegara.

According to the residents, the agents have no permits and are only a front for the owners to extort money from Indonesian workers returning from overseas.

Residents Madang, 29, and Agus, 35, said that the locals, upset with the belated efforts of the mayoralty office, recently approached one of the travel agent offices to press their demands.

The residents said the presence of the agents in the area have disturbed the locals, since many of the newly arrived Indonesian workers had often been seen running from the offices after being squeezed for money by the agency staff.

"Once, a female worker from Malaysia, Sarkati of Central Java, ran to our neighborhood from one of the offices. She said she was forced to pay 200 Malaysian ringgit for the transportation fees to her hometown in Pati," Agus said.

Police and residents said the illegal agents ran their businesses by deploying their staff at the airport compound, pretending to be workers who had just arrived and were looking for transportation to their hometowns.

They would then lure the real workers to their offices, located near the airport, where they would extort the workers' money.

According to Tangerang Police chief Lt. Col. Pudji Hartanto, his office has reported the case to the Tangerang mayoralty office.

"There has been no response so far," he said.(41/bsr)