Vendors complain over hoodlums
JAKARTA (JP): Dozens of street vendors complained on Monday that the city administration had hired hoodlums armed with sickles to drive them away from an intersection in South Jakarta, where they had been operating their businesses.
Accompanied by advisers from the Jakarta Legal Aid Foundation (LBH Jakarta), the vendors told the National Commission on Human Rights (Komnas HAM) that the hoodlums had threatened and physically abused them.
The traders operate at the so-called CSW intersection on Jl. Sisingamangaraja where several offices, including the Jakarta electricity utility's offices, the Attorney General's Office, and the Secretariat of the Association of Southeast Asia Nations (ASEAN), stand.
A noodle vendor, Eme, said that he and his fellow vendors had been forced by dozens of hoodlums, who claimed to be acting at the behest of the city administration, to leave the site prior to the beginning of the Muslim fasting month in December last year.
"They held sickles to our necks. Even now, some of us still haven't the nerve to show up there again," he told reporters.
His friend Yaya, who has been selling soft drinks in the area for the last 11 years, said that the hoodlums had also extorted money from the vendors. He alleged that they were paid some Rp 500,000 (around US$53) every 10 "working" days by the city administration.
The vendors, members of the Association of CSW Intersection Street Vendors (PPKL CSW), have received the support of their fellow vendors on Jl. Sudirman-Thamrin, Central Jakarta and the Cawang bypass, East Jakarta. About 60 vendors from the three locations came to the Human Rights Commission on Monday.
Rosidi, a member of the association, claimed that he had been beaten up by the hoodlums and, as a result, had to be treated at home for nine days.
Tubagus Haryo Karbyanto, head of the city and urban dwellers division of the LBH Jakarta, urged the commission to protect the human rights of the vendors against the arbitrary policies of the city administration and to encourage the city police to eradicate the hoodlums instead of tolerating their existence.
"We consider that the hoodlums' existence here has been accepted by the city administration, and they are even being employed in city raids against street vendors," he told the commission, which was represented by B.N. Marbun and Soegiri.
They asked the city to stop violating their human rights.
"Instead of paying the hoodlums to beat us, it would be better for the city to give us the money. We want a dialogue with the administration to find the best solution, to find a place where we can do our business without being chased away," vendor Yaya said.(bby)