Ten officials injured in Senen incident

Ten officials injured in Senen incident

JAKARTA (JP): At least 10 city officials were injured on
Tuesday morning after being beaten by angry street vendors
operating around the busy Senen market in Central Jakarta, a
police officer said.

Head of the Central Jakarta Police Command and Operation
Control Center, Maj. Ricky F. Wakanno, said the traders first
upturned the officials' vehicle before chasing and beating them
up.

The officer said the injured officials consisted of seven
civil defense personnel from the nearby Gambir district office
and three officials from the Central Jakarta's Public Order
Office.

Ricky said three of them were suffering from head injuries and
were still being treated at different hospitals.

"The rest have been released after receiving treatment for
light injuries at Gambir health center," the officer said.

The traders, who display their goods on the sidewalk and the
edge of Jl. Pasar Senen, separately claimed that they only
managed to beat one of the officers.

They recalled that the clash took place at around 9 a.m.
shortly after the arrival of a group of six men, who attempted to
remove vendors from the sidewalk and the street.

Manurung, a handbag trader, said he and his fellow traders
blocked the progress of the officials' vehicle and pushed it
over.

Five of the officials managed to escape the mob, while one was
badly beaten by the vendors, he explained.

"We chased them, but we only caught one," Manurung said.

The traders said they were angry after learning that their
plastic tents, wooden carts, boxes and boards used to display
their merchandises had been taken by public order officials in a
predawn raid on Tuesday.

M. Yani, a street trader selling pirated VCDs, said: "We were
about to start our business in the morning, when we learned that
our carts, boxes and benches had been taken."

He said they suspected that it was the work of city public
order officials.

Manurung added, "The already tense situation turned explosive
with the arrival of the six personnel, who appeared suddenly and
wanted to clear out the area this morning."

But officer Ricky said the traders took out their anger on the
wrong people.

The 10 men, he said, were about to end the night shift and be
replaced by their colleagues when the incident occurred.

"They were driving in a city public order pickup truck and
passing through the area when some 200 vendors ran after the car
and turned it over," Ricky said.

Different personnel from the city Public Order Office raided
the area in the early hours of the day, filling three trucks with
tents, carts and boxes belong to the traders, he said.

No one has been arrested or questioned in relation to the
incident, which left many motorists and commuters in a state of
panic.

Police immediately deployed 200 personnel to secure the area.

In the afternoon, the usually crowded Senen market and
environs resumed to normal.

Some of the street traders even began laying out their
merchandise onto the sidewalk and street, as if challenging
Public Order officials to raid their goods again. Many of them
used the market's iron fence to display their goods.

Others constructed new carts and benches to replace those that
had been seized by the city officials earlier in the day.

However, most of the street vendors could not hide their
worries of a fresh raid by public order staff.

A few meters away, three military trucks were seen parked
below the Senen flyover with dozens of personnel from the
police's elite Mobile Brigade Unit hanging around the spot.

The Project Senen market and nearby Plaza Atrium were packed
with visitors as usual.

Most of the street traders blamed the incident on the
merchants selling goods from kiosks in the Blok IV shopping
center located behind their makeshift stalls.

They said that those people trading from Blok IV were unhappy
with their presence since they blocked potential customers' views
of their wares.

"They paid a certain amount of money to the public order
officials to force us to leave the site," Manurung said.

Blok IV traders said the accusation was groundless, however.

"We are indeed annoyed by their presence on the sidewalks
since they block shoppers' views. But, it isn't true that we
asked city officials to force them out," trader Jeffrey said.

He speculated that the action was carried out simply to help
overcome the chronic traffic congestion on Jl. Pasar Senen and
help stop other misdemeanors, such as the growing number of
pickpockets, in the area. (06/nvn/asa)