Hi folks,
How’s your week been? We had two holidays this week and we hope you weren’t one of those people who got stuck in Puncak traffic for 12 hours or longer despite Covid. We desperately need other great short term holiday destinations. It’s the 2020s, not 1980s anymore, for cryin’ out loud, why aren’t people attracted to places other than Puncak? We’re looking at you, Sandiaga.
Anyway, despite the short working week, there’s a ton of stuff we think are must reads or must knows for the week.
PSI Loathe You
The Indonesian Solidarity Party (PSI) used to position itself as a youthful, pro-democracy, progressive party but that notion went out the window this week when people discovered that the only thing the PSI is in solidarity with is the status-quo.
PSI Secretary General, Dea Tunggaesti said her party supported the idea of amending the Constitution so that President Jokowi can run for a third term.
"As a lover and admirer of Pak Jokowi, we will always and continue (sic) to support Pak Jokowi in again leading Indonesia, but of course that must be done by an amending the Constitution which would allow Jokowi to participate in (the) 2024 election," she said.
Mind you, she said this in a written statement and not some spur-of-the-moment interview. The statement was distributed to all media outlets.
Dea said that amending the Constitution will not only benefit Jokowi, but his predecessor SBY and Jokowi's former VP Jusuf Kalla who couldn't be Jokowi's wingman the second time around because he already served one term as VP during SBY’s presidency.
One pundit said the statement is tarnishing PSI's reputation as a political party and could cost them their original fanbase. And it looks like not everyone at the party agrees with the statement, including the head of the party’s Jakarta chapter.
Jokowi has not spoken about PSI’s statement, but he did say he was against being president for a third term back in 2019. We’ll see if he still feels the same.
Ironically, Dea was responding to suggestions that the 2024 election be postponed, which the PSI, according to Dea, disagreed with.
Porkies Over Election Postponement
Chairman of the National Awakening Party (PKB) Muhaimin Iskandar originally floated the idea to postpone the election back in February, claiming that the country needs more time for the economy to recover and a large-scale general election would put a dampener on the growth. Never mind that spending for the 2019 election was more than 2.5 times greater than for the 2014 elections.
Candidates across all levels of governments spent a total of IDR1.1 trillion between 2018 and 2019 and IDR429 billion in 2013-2014 according to Nielsen Advertising Intelligence.
The 2014 elections had little impact to the economy due to an increase in interest rates and a dramatically smaller pool of parties. The 2019 election did not contribute significantly to the economy either, it was the lack of exports that kept growth down that year. In other words, recent elections did not contribute negatively to the economy. Muhaimin Iskandar doesn't have history backing his concern.
Muhaimin also claimed that his suggestion was supported by the majority of Indonesians. He even claimed that he had conducted… we kid you not…. a “Big Data” analysis of 100 million social media users, 60% of whom were in favor of postponing the election.
Then there were Golkar Party chairman Airlangga Hartarto and National Mandate Party (PAN) chairman Zulkifli Hasan who echoed the sentiment.
There are suspicions that the palace was behind the suggestion to postpone the election, to see how the public would react. The palace has denied this calling it an imaginative accusation. The next day, however, the President was quoted, saying “anyone can propose a discourse of election postponement or extension … because this is a democracy … but when it comes to the implementation, everyone has to abide by the constitution.” So if they do manage to change the constitution, as PSI is suggesting … *wink, wink*
A stark departure from the President’s 2019 statement when he said, “if anyone were to suggest that, there are three (reasons), I think; they want to slap my face, looking for favors, or (push me off a cliff).” Harsh words to take back, there, Mr. Prez.
Welcome Big Brother
During his speech at a TNI-Police leaders' meeting at the TNI HQ, President Jokowi said that soldiers must maintain their discipline and loyalty, citing that there have been soldiers and their wives who expressed their disapproval over the new capital on WhatsApp groups.
And the response from the TNI and Police are chilling, promising that they will tightly monitor what is being said on those groups and discipline those who don’t toe the line.
While it's true that soldiers don't have the same right to freedom of expression as us civilians, the fact that someone has been monitoring WhatsApp groups for discussions on the new capital is kinda creepy.
One security expert criticized the remark saying there are more pressing issues to be discussed at the meeting such as what is happening in Eastern Europe right now or how this will impact Indonesia's defense cooperation.
Meanwhile, one law expert said Jokowi should explain how he obtained such private and personal conversations because by law you’re not supposed to do that unless it’s for law enforcement purposes, adding that this is jeopardizing democracy and a serious human rights violation.
The new capital issue appeared to be a hot topic among civil servants as well.
Maria Qibtya, head of the Jakarta Regional Personnel Agency revealed that her office has been swamped with central government employees requesting to be transferred to city government offices because they don't want to move to the new capital.
Jakarta Governor Anies Baswedan confirmed this but added that there is no way the city will accept the transfer request because they already have enough civil servants.
But the Minister for Administrative and Bureaucratic Reform said the civil servants must do as they are told and have no choice but to move to the new capital. His Ministry however promised that there will be incentives if they move.
Welcome Back, Aussies!
Instead of the 14th, starting Monday 7 March, international arrivals in Bali no longer have to undergo any kind of quarantine. Bali’s provincial government made the announcement on Friday night in a press release. Yay!
The decision was made in close consultation with the Covid-19 Task Force along with Coordinating Minister for Maritime and Investment Luhut Pandjaitan as the head of PPKM coordination for Java and Bali, according to the release.
Of course, travelers will still have to be fully vaccinated, have proof of a minimum four day hotel accommodation or proof of residence, and a negative PCR test result prior to departure as well as on arrival.
Visa on arrival is enforced for foreigners from 23 countries including all ASEAN countries, Australia, New Zealand, the US, the UK, Canada, Germany, Italy, France, the Netherlands, Japan, South Korea, Qatar, Turkey, and the UAE. No Russia (duh) nor China, though, two of the largest origins of visitors to Bali in recent years.
While it seemed like the government was being indecisive, this is in fact in line with the announcement by the Minister himself on 28 Feb when he said travelers to Bali won’t require quarantine from 14 March, but that may be brought forward by one week if situations improve. Which it has, at least officially.
For the week ending 27 February, Bali had over 4,100 cases but this past week that number was just over 1,500. In terms of national percentage, Bali went from 1.4% to 0.5%. Clearly that’s an improvement.
Whether the numbers are real or made up, the Minister has invited anyone to take a look and compare the data with the on-field reality after an unnamed neighbor apparently accused Indonesia of manipulating the numbers.
Some time ago the government justified its rapidly changing measures as keeping up with the situation but businesses and travelers don’t have the capacity to also follow the changes at the same pace. Plans have to be made, supplies have to be arranged, workers or staff must be hired, planes, hotels, and flight routes must be booked, and so on. So it’s not an ideal situation and we’ve seen this before.
Bali was reopened to tourists in October with as few restrictions as possible at the time, but not a single international flight had landed even by December. Will it be different this time?
The Puncak Road Congestion Crisis
Ahh, the nostalgic getaway for many residents of Greater Jakarta since long before most of us were born. The highlands of Puncak, West Java has been a perennial favorite for holiday makers looking for a cooler change from Jakarta’s heat.
As the population grows, however, so does the traffic. At least for the past 20 years, maybe even longer, we can’t recall, the police have had to implement varying ways to control the flood of car traffic in and out of the region. During last week’s long weekend, Bogor police reported 82,000 vehicles entering the Puncak area over three days with 27,000 still stuck on the roads on Monday.
From time restrictions to alternating traffic flows and even taking turns based on license plate numbers, these measures have done little to alleviate the congestion. The interest to spend the down time in Puncak just keeps growing, much faster than anyone can handle. It’s also exacerbated by the growth of its development as a tourist area.
Tourism Minister Sandiaga Uno this week proposed having a cable car system to solve the eternal road congestion problem. Seems that he may have read up recently about Bandung’s cable car idea.
Back in 2010 when Ridwan Kamil was still a big shot architect leading Bandung’s Creative Community Forum, he suggested that the city needed a cable car system to serve the hilly areas. In 2013 as the city’s mayor, he put forward the idea again. In July 2017 he said it would take 9 months to complete the construction. He’s now the Governor of West Java and the cable car remains a pipe dream.
“I offered several solutions,” the Tourism Minister said. “We have to have a permanent solution. A cable car is one option,” he said on Tuesday 1/3 at a media briefing. He’s taken a look at several cities around the world with mountainous regions that have the cable car system in place. He wants the cable car to be a transportation method, not just a tourist attraction.
Transport Minister Budi Karya Sumadi back in 2020 conceded that traffic is just one of the myriad problems Puncak faces. “The complexity of Puncak’s problems cannot be solved merely by solving transportation alone,” he said.
He highlighted the constant development of the area attracting more and more visitors and that all the various traffic management measures put in place over the last few decades have been merely short term solutions.
“We want a more comprehensive narrative,” he emphasized. So he suggested a bus route, which has yet to go ahead.
One of Minister Sandiaga’s hopes is something that actually falls under his own Ministry’s responsibilities. “Holiday makers who traditionally go to Puncak on long weekends, hopefully they find alternative entertainment destinations,” he said, without a hint of irony. Though he did suggest alternatives such as The Thousand Islands, Tanjung Lesung, and Bogor Botanical Gardens, people just aren’t as keen on going to those places, and that’s on him, his Ministry, and his predecessors.
Just the Authorities being Bullies Again
Remember that regent from North Sumatra who has a dungeon in his house?
Remember that authorities could have acted sooner since the dungeon has been used to jail drug users and basically enslave them since 2012 but only cracked down on the facility when the regent was arrested for graft and his house was raided by the Corruption Eradication Commission? Well there might be a reason for that.
The National Commission on Human Rights (Komnas HAM) this week revealed that at least 19 individuals had been involved in the beating and inhumane treatment of those incarcerated. According to the Komnas HAM, six people have died while incarcerated at the dungeon since the so-called rehabilitation facility started.
Among these 19 were police officers, soldiers, members of the local civil organization and members of the regent’s family who acted as either caretakers, wardens and supervisors while others provided security.
The Witness and Victim Protection Agency (LPSK) said that there were at least 5 soldiers with links to the dungeon. The agency also suspected the presence of a third cell (there were only two inside the house) but refused to divulge further details.
The regent also had his own manhunt team to track down escapees and some of those incarcerated were not only abused were also sexually assaulted.
The military said they will punish those proven to be involved in the dungeon but decided not to launch its own investigation, putting everything on police’s hands.
Meanwhile, police said that they are still investigating the case and no one has been charged with anything yet although the regent is being detained related to his corruption case.
Quick Reads
BPOM extended AstraZeneca vaccine expiry dates
Millions of doses of AstraZeneca vaccines that were set to expire at the end of February have had their shelf lives extended by three months by the Indonesian Food and Drug Authority. They said the efficacy study allowed the extension to be applied and that AstraZeneca themselves supported the move.
Visa and MasterCard suspend operations in Russia
In the coming days, transactions made with Visa or MasterCard branded cards issued by Russian banks may no longer be processed and the cards won’t be usable at ATMs, locking millions of people from their money as part of the wide ranging sanctions due to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Russia denies the cards won’t be usable.
Ello thanked legendary band Dewa for having him as lead vocal, fans went nuts.
Popular rock/grunge and former R&B/pop singer Marcello Tahitoe, best known as Ello, had been reported as being selected to be Dewa’s new lead vocal. Sort of. The manager later cleared up the air saying that it’s a featuring arrangement, not a full time role. Fans of Dewa were already throwing hot takes and getting into discussions whether Ello can fill the role of former lead singers Ari Lasso and Elfonda “Once” Mekel. Dewa has not had a full time lead vocalist since 2011.