Plis Deh Jakarta!

In a somewhat signature act of far-flung vision with terrible planning, the outgoing governor, Sutiyoso, launched the city water taxis in June 2007, spending Rp 200 billion on the facilities with a pilot project serving a 1.7 km route with two 28-person boats. So where is it now?

The first few trips failed when, among others, garbage got stuck in the boat’s rotors. This, and not to mention that apparently not all of Ciliwung River can be dredged to serve such a water transport service.

So Rp 200 billion and ambition = nothing happening.

To declare their alliance for the upcoming presidential elections, the Megawati-Prabowo election team has selected the Bantar Gebang dumpsite for the location, for some sort of PR effect – I think they want to be seen as ‘close to the people’.

Yet I guess their definition of ‘leave the dumpsite as it has always been’ means setting up a huge stage and tent, placing down a walkway made of placing blocks, and so on, and is actually a few hundred meters from the actual dumpsite.

The only thing they did not try to get rid of was the smell – hopefully the smell is enough for the campaign team to not just make this into a PR event, but something to act on.

Dear political parties and representative candidates,

We here at Plis Deh Jakarta want to tell you some of our thoughts on a few points.

Things that will not get you elected:

• driving around in your VW Caravelle to visit poor areas for PR shots
• using facilities from taxpayer’s money to run your campaign (i.e. government car)
• being a virtual nobody. If people don’t know you, most likely they won’t vote for you, either. Placing a million posters of your face on every street won’t change that.

Things that has no relevance to you getting elected:

• getting a lot of people to ride cars, buses or motorcycles wearing the same t-shirt
• getting those people to ride around the city waving flags and creating traffic jams
• spending billions to gather those people in the city centre for speeches. Chances are the people there have already made up their mind on who to vote for, so the speeches are moot
• claiming family ties to a certain famous person, on the poster
• wearing a pici/kopiah on your campaign posters. 

Things that might get you elected:

• look good on those posters. No, forget about the picture with the lion, or the James Bond impersonation. Just look good.
• try to say what your mission is or what you represent on those posters. Putting on ‘Mohon Doa dan Dukungannya’ doesn’t really say anything.
• Go out door-to-door if need be. Who knows, it might even be more effective than spending billions on a 1-day political rally
• Make sure you have a clear, simple campaign message. Right know, we can’t tell the difference between the multitude of political parties

Things you really should think about rather than only about getting elected:

• clean, transparent governance
• equal rights and better welfare
• conserving the environment
• better public transportation systems
• cheaper internet!!

Sincerely,

Plis Deh Jakarta

The new US secretary-of-state and arguably one of the most powerful women in the world, Hillary Clinton, will be visiting Jakarta this February. I can imagine the anti-US protest marches already, blaming the US for anything from high gasoline prices, the world economic collapse to a really bad Indiana Jones sequel. People will be denouncing SBY for meeting with the representative from the so-called Zionist supporter state and some may call for an edict stating Hillary Clinton is haram.

Hey, I’m no big fan of the US either but they did bless us with the likes of Baywatch and American Idol. Let’s just keep it real man. Those angry masses usually used for large-scale demonstrations would do wonders to the city if they were simply told to clean up litter in all of Jakarta’s streets (and rivers). All that anti-US rethoric is really getting old.

Several PKS (Prosperous Justice Party) were named suspects in an alleged illegal politicl campaign rally. The event said to be a disguised campaign move was the long-march of PKS sympathizers from Bunderan HI to the US Embassy, numbering to around 200.000 people, protesting the attack of Israel on Gaza (which is still continuing today).

The party head reacted to this saying that the rally was a humanitarian rally to support Palestine, and is no way a political campaign.

Yes, and all those PKS flags and banners brought by the crowd just happened to be there.

For the record: Plis Deh Jakarta condemns the humanitarian atrocities occuring right now in Gaza, but also condemns random rocket attacks on innocent civilians.

Check this out – our beloved ex-governor describes on how he successfully led Jakarta to a group of people who live very far away from Jakarta.

Free schooling up to high school?

Health cards for the poor?

Money for each subdistrict (lurah)?

And a budget of Rp 21 trillion?

I must be a really, really bad citizen to not know any of this.

A view from outside of one of the political party offices. We blurred out the party name… a bit.

Close-up: despite having tons of party flags, the office only has one small, measly Indonesian flag on the car.

Submitted by iiiccchhhaaa.

As mentioned in a previous post, there are many campaign banners going up all over Jakarta with faces and party affiliations on them. We don’t know who they are, what they stand for, but they definitely have clear complexions and well-defined make-up. Check out the lady’s lipstick on the right, for instance, and the generally unblemished faces. So unblemished that they seem to be cartoonish, indicating Photoshop manipulation.

Would we recognize them in real life, let alone vote for them?

Submitted by iiiccchhhaaa.

For a few months now, Jakarta’s side streets (and in some cases the main ones as well) have been filled with posters of every shape and colour, with the picture of someone who generally we don’t know, and their political party affiliation. Oh, their name printed in big letters as well for good measure, including their district.

I don’t know who these people are (and perhaps couldn’t care less), but how would an interested voter find out more about their possible candidate of choice? Or party of choice, even? I’m pretty sure that most Jakartans couldn’t tell their PDS from their PKS, let alone parties with similar – but still different – agendas and programs. Now, I’m sure that each and every one of these political parties has some sort of manifesto or policy brief, but in most cases it’s in the form of political gibberish worth pages and pages of reading. Strangely, they never try to explain this in the simplest terms to the man on the street (well, perhaps since they haven’t done their roadshows yet), and a simplified slogan of their goals and policies are strangely never in the ubiquitous posters, banners and so forth.

For the lack of a better, more relevant to Jakarta example, even Barack Obama’s presidential campaign summed up all of his policies to one word: Change.

OK. These people that we don’t know, from parties we don’t really know, are asking for us to vote for them, but we don’t know what they stand for? Are they really expecting for votes by purely name recognition only, after barraging the general public with these posters?

Really, friends from said political parties. We the people may be stupid and ignorant, but it doesn’t mean we have to stay that way.

Submitted by Zsachaz. Thanks Cha!

FPI members vented their frustration to police members and an Ahmadiyah mosque when their leader, Habieb Rizieq, and one of his lieutenants, was senteced to jail because of their involvement in the Monas incident many months ago.

You may clain to defend Islam, but what we really need is to be defended from you. Short tempers and misguided priorities are a dangerous mix.

It’s funny how their all white attire encites fear and resentment, instead of inspiring purity and respect. They want us to hate the entire non-Muslim world, but eventually end up the object of hate, even from fellow Muslims.

Great job, man!