Sampit tragedy

Sampit tragedy

From Kompas

Many have attributed the human tragedy in Sampit to the tardiness of government, including those in charge of security. Under regional autonomy, utmost responsibility would lie with the head of a province or regency. Of course, we cannot simply blame such officials before taking a close look at the area in question.

It is really a shame that a regional head must now assume wide-ranging responsibility such as maintaining security and order and guaranteeing safety and security in the community, without the authority to give a direct command to security officers.

The regional police are not under the command of a regional head; they are under the command of the regional police chief (at a district or provincial level). The head of a regional administration and a regional police chief can only coordinate with each other through the regional leaders' consultative body, (Muspida), which, unfortunately, is not very active at present.

Hence I call on legislators discussing the bill on the police to include a stipulation that regional police should be put, on a tactical and operational basis, under the head of a regional administration. The regional police would be administratively independent.

A regional administration would allocate operational costs for the police in its regional budget. In this way, I am sure that a regional administration can realize its determination to maintain security and eradicate illegal logging, gambling, scalping and the like. The regional council could directly exercise control over the local administrations' performance.

Let us make the Sampit tragedy a valuable lesson so that we can put things right in future.

HM SAID

Banjarmasin