Scalpers still operate in Gambir

Leo Wahyudi S, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

Ticket scalpers were still hanging around at Gambir railway station, Central Jakarta on Friday, four days after idul Fitri.

They moved around freely, approaching would-be passengers with offers of tickets for several destinations.

Iskandar, who planned to travel to Malang, East Java, with his wife, said that he had reluctantly agreed to buy tickets from a scalper as he could not get any from the ticket office.

The couple paid Rp 200,000, while the official fare was only Rp 150,000.

In Gambir, there were several long queues for Bandung and Cirebon, West Java, and Purwokerto, Central Java.

"I'd rather buy a ticket myself," said a young man, who had been lining up for two hours.

Two hours, however, was nothing compared with last week, when people had to spend the night at the station before struggling for a ticket.

Security officers noticed that the scalpers were there, but they simply ignored them, even though they had pledged earlier to crack down on them.

A different situation was observed at the reservations office at Jl. Juanda, Central Jakarta, where not a single ticket scalper dared to show up near the people queuing for executive train tickets.

"We use a personal approach when dealing with scalpers," the commander of a group of 10 Mobile Brigade security personnel told The Jakarta Post.

Meanwhile, records indicated that around 13,200 passengers departed from Gambir on Thursday, an increase of around 16 percent compared with regular departures at the station.

A total of 32,700 passengers departed from Jakarta's eight railway stations on Thursday, meaning there was a 10 percent decrease in the number of people who had left on Wednesday, Zainal Abidin, the spokesman of state railway company PT Kereta Api Indonesia, said.

All the economy seats for departures this weekend were already sold out on Friday, while a few were still available for executive trains.