Sutiyoso notorious for hostile attitude toward street traders
Damar Harsanto, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta
For those working in informal sector businesses, Governor Sutiyoso, who was installed for a second term on Monday, is notorious for his hostile policy toward them.
"Who says we have a new governor? We have the same old one, the one we hate, as he (Sutiyoso) has made us suffer," said Yogyakarta-born Suwarto, 45, a sidewalk vendor at Jatinegara flea market in East Jakarta.
With Sutiyoso's reelection, Suwarto remarked, their hardship would be prolonged, even made worse.
"Almost every week, we, street traders here, must rush to escape violent raids carried out by city public order officers," said Suwarto, who has been running his business for four years.
The city administration has regularly carried out raids on street vendors, who are accused of disturbing public order and causing traffic jams in the area, as they often run their businesses not only at the roadside, but also on part of the road too.
The raids, however, are not effective as the vendors always return to the sites because there is no relocation program, while certain officers allow them to operate after paying a bribe.
Azas Tigor Nainggolan of the Jakarta Residents Forum (Fakta) contended that Sutiyoso's reelection spelled further trouble for informal sector businesses, given the incumbent's bad record.
"We have already witnessed Sutiyoso's policies (during his first five-year term), which are unfriendly toward the informal sector," said Tigor.
He added those hostile policies were manifest in incessant raids carried out on pedicab drivers and street vendors, and in the eviction of squatters.
The informal sector encompasses a wide range of services and trade in goods, including house servants, market sellers, scavengers and construction workers, to name but a few. More people work in the sector especially after the economic crisis hit the country in 1997.
The latest survey on the country's employment indicators by the Central Statistics Agency (BPS) showed that 62 percent, or 55.6 million people, of the 89.7 million employed in the country, worked in the informal sector.
Tigor blasted the city administration for having double standards in dealing with informal sector businesses.
"On the one hand, the administration never acknowledges their existence, but on the other, some of its unscrupulous and corrupt officials extort them as their cash cow," said Tigor.
Tigor suggested the administration recognize the informal sector as a potential and significant source of income to the city's coffers rather than as a problem.
"We should bear in mind that they (informal sector businesses) never trouble the administration over capital or job creation. Instead, they create both their own jobs and a market for themselves," said Tigor.
Referring to his personal observation of over 400 fruit vendors at Pasar Rebo, East Jakarta, last year, Tigor said that they paid illegal fees of Rp 135,000 per month to rent a plot of land.
"Still, they were required to pay other fees for "security" to local hoodlums and for rubbish disposal to garbagemen, totaling about Rp 5,000 a day," Tigor said.
Similarly, Irwanto, an urban policy expert at Atmajaya University, criticized the administration for having no idea about how to deal with informal sector businesses.
"The administration's policy tends to side with those who have massive capital and neglect small-scale businesses, such as those run within the informal sector. As a result, only those who have money can afford the hefty rents in multistory buildings, while small traders can only use the pavements and roadsides," said Irwanto.
He contended that small-scale businesses could therefore not be blamed if they used pavements and roadsides, given the administration's failure to provide alternative, suitable sites at which they could operate.
Tigor said the administration's hostile policy toward the informal sector indicated its failure to understand the nature of the sector as one of the economic pillars of the city's economy.