Street vendors allowed to operate during Ramadhan

Muninggar Sri Saraswati, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

Street vendors can breath a sigh of relief this Ramadhan as the city administration finally bowed to public pressure to temporarily stop the crack down against traders during the fasting month.

Head of the Jakarta Public Order Office Firman Hutajulu said on Monday that he would not conduct raids on the vendors even though they conducted their business on the streets and disturbed traffic flow.

"They are illegal, but we will not conduct raids against them because it's Ramadhan," Hutajulu told reporters at City Hall.

Last weekend, Governor Sutiyoso vowed to continue the crack down on the street vendors in spite of the statement of Minister of Manpower and Transmigration Jacob Nuwa Wea that street vendors should be regulated and guided instead of being evicted.

Meanwhile the street vendors threatened to resist if the city officers conducted raids against them during Ramadhan.

"We will fight against it with force, if we have to," said Munawir, a street vendor in Jatinegara area, East Jakarta.

"I have a family to feed. Besides, I need money to celebrate Idul Fitri," he said.

"I don't understand why the administration always treats us like trash. We are vendors, not hoodlums."

Another street vendor in the area, Munawir, said he always paid Rp 1,500 as a daily fee to a subdistrict officer.

Munawir has run his business in the area for over five years. In the past couple of years, the administration had evicted them several times, he said. However, the vendors always reerected their temporary stalls soon after the eviction.

Separately, Tinus, who operates in Tanah Abang, said that eviction was nothing new to street vendors. He said that he would usually suspend his business activities when he heard about a planned operation against street vendors, but would set up his stall again after a few days.

Tinus, 28, who sells sport shoes off Jl. Fachrudin, near Tanah Abang market, said he always paid a fee of Rp 2,000 to an officer from Tanah Abang market.

"We are legal vendors although we don't rent a stall in the market building," he claimed. "Being a street vendor is the only thing we can do and I think it's better than being a hoodlum or a thief."

Another street vendor in the Pasar Minggu area, South Jakarta, shared the same view.

"We need a space. All this time, the administration has evicted us without providing any solution," Medi told the Post, on Jl. Pasar Minggu.

Medi usually earned up to Rp 50,000 a day, but his earnings would double during Ramadhan.

"Does the administration expect us to become criminals?" he said, questioning the Jakarta Public Order Office's policy on the crack down against them.