Scalpers, collusion wreck low-cost housing hopes
Rendi A. Witular, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta
The City Administration hopes that people from the slum areas will move into low-cost, centrally located apartments built for them, but collusion between scalpers and certain city officials is damaging those hopes. And the units are being sold to middle- class Jakartans, who are not legally eligible.
The city plans to allocate Rp 1.6 trillion (US$166.84 million) to build the low-cost apartments for the 30,000 or so families currently living as illegal squatters along the riverbanks and other common areas throughout Jakarta.
The high demand for low-cost apartments has produced a thriving group of scalpers who buy up the units from the former slum dwellers, and sell them for higher prices, completely defeating the original purpose.
The scalpers can be seen operating at the construction site for the apartment block on Jl. Petamburan in Central Jakarta. They have even opened a temporary office in front of the site to accommodate potential buyers.
The three-tower apartment block, comprising 600 units, has fairly strict regulations which allocate the housing to low- income Jakartans, including eviction and fire victims. Currently around 400 units, originally owned by the victims, are being offered for sale, in defiance of the laws and regulations.
With the administration plans to officially open the apartment complex on June 22 -- in commemoration of Jakarta's 475th anniversary -- fancy cars have already been seen in the parking lot. The car owners were seen negotiating with the scalpers.
One of the chief scalpers, Gede, said on Tuesday that he could "help" arrange all the documents needed for the new buyers, regardless of eligibility.
"We'll prepare all the necessary documents including an identity card and a family card, issued by the Petamburan subdistrict, to fulfill the prerequisite to buy each unit in the apartment. No worries. You can also pick which unit you like," he told a reporter posing as a buyer.
The City Housing Agency code states that each apartment owner's certificate of eligibility must not be handed over to anyone except for relatives or other residents of Petamburan subdistrict.
Gede said he could easily falsify the buyer's identity in order to appear as a relative of an eligible owner of the unit by adding the buyer to the original owner's family card.
"Piece of cake. We just have to pay certain officials at the Petamburan subdistrict office to get you on the family card as a cousin. They'll make you a new ID as a Petamburan resident."
"Each buyer only has to pay Rp 18 million (US$1,877) to possess the ownership certificate for the cheapest units located on the fifth floor, and an additional Rp 1 million to process the new ID card and family card," he said.
Gede claimed the original residents decided to sell their apartments due to their inability to pay for them, which he claimed was more than Rp 20 million, payable over a five to 15- year period.
However, an official at the agency's apartment division, Sipayung, contradicted Gede, saying that the original price of the most expensive unit was only Rp 15 million payable in one lump sum or over time.
Similar scalper operations were also found at the Tebet Barat Apartments II on Jl. Tebet Barat in South Jakarta and at the Benhil Apartments on Jl. Pejompongan in Central Jakarta.
Another example is the Kebon Kacang apartment complex which is located near the Jl. M.H. Thamrin business area.
Sipayung admitted that the Agency already knew of the existence of the scalpers but said it was powerless to do anything.
"We don't have strong enough regulations or the manpower to handle the issue. Before the eligible residents received the units, they had to sign a promissory statement which said they could not sell the units for any reason. But the statement does not contain any punishment," he groaned.