Surjadi promises to review city regulation on radio taxes
JP/3/RADIO/0
Surjadi promises to review city regulation on radio taxes
JAKARTA (JP): In response to opposition from the public over the city's putsch to reintroduce a radio tax, Governor Surjadi Soedirdja has promised to review the regulation.
Surjadi said on Thursday that pending the review the collection of the taxes will continue.
"But I have told my officials not to seize radios if their owners cannot pay the taxes,"said Surjadi, adding that tax officials should take into account the taxpayers financial standing
"We, for example, will absolutely not confiscate a radio from an owner of a cigarette stall if this is the one and only radio he owns, even though he has not paid his radio taxes," Surjadi said.
Surjadi's remarks were intended to reassure a public who have questioned the motives and likely outcomes of a municipal policy that was abandoned for more than a decade.
City councilors are not of one mind on the outdated radio tax.
Many members of the United Development Part (PPP) faction and the Indonesian Democratic Party (PDI) are against the city administration policy, while councilors from the Armed Forces (ABRI) and Golkar are in support.
Ismunandar, one of the City Council's three deputy chairmen, said he wondered whether the collection of radio taxes can be carried out effectively as the governor's office does not have data on the number of radios owned by Jakartans.
Big houses usually have five to six radios, but report only one, Ismunandar said, adding that house-to-house searches will not be possible.
When asked about the controversy, Ismunandar said the city administration should first focus on making an inventory, rather than collecting taxes on the radios owned by Jakartans.
Meanwhile Sutarno, the chairman of the City Council's Commission A on law enforcement, told the Post he believes the poor can pay the tax.
"It is only Rp 3,000 a year, not a month, and it can be paid in installments. So, if the poor pay in monthly installments, every month they are required to pay Rp 250. This means that everyday they only have to put aside Rp 10 from their income," said Sutarno, who is also a member of the ABRI faction at the City Council.
Sutarno said should owners be too poor to pay, they could go to the head of their neighborhood or community units and apply for a tax exemption.
"After all, the radio tax regulation is not unchangeable. For the time being let the city administration proceed with the taxing,"Sutarno said.
Helmy A.R. Syihab, the head of the Commission C on finance, told The Jakarta Post that the taxing of car radios should be a priority because this can simply be done by placing an official of the city police in charge of collections from car owners who come there to pay motor-vehicle taxes every year.
"Why doesn't the city administration do the same thing the Red Cross does when it levies the so-called Red Cross donation on train tickets or movie tickets?" Helmy asked.
The Red Cross usually declares one month a year as a fund raising month and sends officials to bus stations, seaports and airports as well as railway stations to collect from passengers of public transit vehicles.(06/has)