Thousands of uncensored VCDs confiscated
JAKARTA (JP): Police confiscated over 31,000 of illegal video compact discs (VCDs) on Saturday in a crackdown at a warehouse in Tanah Abang, Central Jakarta.
The target of this operation was PT Vision InterPrima, an importer and distributor of VCDs.
According to the police, VCDs sold by the company had not passed screening at the Film Censorship Board (BSF) and therefore had no BSF stickers on their covers as required by the existing regulation.
"Altogether, we set our target at four places that stock illegal VCDs," city police detectives chief Col. Alex Bambang Riatmodjo told reporters on the weekend.
The police raided the office of PT Vision InterPrima on Jl. Tanah Abang II, the company's warehouse in Tanah Abang, and two of its outlets, in Imperium Plaza in Kuningan and Barito Plaza in South Jakarta.
He said police decided to raid the company following public complaints that illegal VCDs have been widely sold in shops and offered in rental stores.
Out of the total of 31,238 VCDs seized in the last Saturday's crackdown, 172 were produced in Indonesia.
Pretty Woman, Payback and Walt Disney's 101 Dalmatians were among the VCDs seized by police.
Alex said PT Vision distributed films, which were either banned by BSF or had not yet passed the censorship board.
He said PT Vision would be charged with article 40 of Law No. 8/1992 on Movie Censorship, violation of which could be punished with a maximum fine of Rp 50 million (US$7,500) or a maximum jail sentence of five years.
The police detective said they had detained the company's operations director, Glenn Sjukuri, who admitted the VCDs were not labeled with BSF stickers.
However, the company's general manager, Muhammad Isori, complained that the BSF had failed to notify them that it had issued new stickers in July.
"We were not informed of the new BSF stickers," he said.
PT Vision is the license holder for movies produced by Warner Bros. and Buena Vista.
The company set the price of its VCDs at Rp 50,000, compared to Rp 20,000 per copy for pirated VCDs.
The police vowed in February to clean up the trading of pirated VCDs and audio CDs, setting a deadline of Feb. 25 for traders to stop the illegal business. (03)