Governor Fauzi Bowo followed President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono's bad attitude when making the decision on fuel prices. When the President hesitated for weeks before eventually announcing the fuel price hike last week, despite the destructive impacts of his hesitation, the governor sacrificed the city's traffic order because he was indecisive about new public transportations in Jakarta.

Both the President and the governor have sacrificed the people because of their lack of self-confidence. It is very difficult to understand why it took more than one week for Governor Fauzi to make up his mind. The governor could have made a much faster decision because the government unofficially disclosed the number of new fuel prices long before the official announcement.

Now the governor has to fix the new transportation tariffs. He must know that millions of Jakartans suffered much from his slow decision.

The governor may need to inspect Jakarta's roads directly to see the impact of his sluggish response to the call from drivers and operators of public transportations for an immediate adjustment of fares, following the recent fuel price hikes by an average of 28.7 percent.

The delay is really regrettable. It has confused all relevant parties -- users, drivers, and operators of the public transportations -- because of the unilateral fare increase and strike by many drivers.

Consumers were often involved in quarreling with drivers over the new unofficial fares. Some just gave in to the wishes of drivers and operators. Many of them also have had to spend much more for motorcycle ojek taxis as their usual transportations disappeared from the roads.

Many drivers preferred to park their vehicles in their garages, while many others were forced to do so by their colleagues at the expense of their daily household spending.

So, what is Governor Fauzi waiting for? He might try to accommodate the aspirations of all stake holders. He actually only needs to seek advice from the city transportation council, which represents experts, bureaucrats as well as users and operators of public transportations.

As a regulator, the city administration also does not need to wait for all parties to agree on new fares because it has had a lot of experience in deciding transportation fares. After all, the process does not need a complicated mathematics calculation.

Governor Fauzi has to immediately make the decision to end uncertainty. There are still many jobs that he has to deal with in connection with the city public transportations.

Operators and drivers of public transportations posed serious problems even before the fuel price increase, including rampant illegal fees, the significant decline of the number of users because many have shifted to motorcycles and the spare parts price increase.

The Jakarta city administration needs to help privately-operated public transportations to survive because like it or not their presence is still badly needed, despite their undisciplined activities while on the roads.

They are still the backbone of the city's transportation system. The busway operated by the city administration and railways operated by the central government have not significantly contributed to city transportation.

The road-based public transportations -- taxis, medium and big buses, as well as minivans -- cover only some 2 percent of the nearly eight million vehicles running on Jakarta's streets, but they are responsible for transporting more than 40 percent of urban travelers every day.

Therefore, it was naive for Governor Fauzi to ignore the public transportation strike. Therefore, while the governments have not been able to create a mass rapid transit system, they have to help privately-operated public transportations to survive because in many other world cities transportation is the responsibility of city governments.

The city administration may find it difficult to meet the demand of some transportation operators for fuel and spare part subsidies because it is the responsibility of the central government. But at least the administration can facilitate them with a tax reduction, granting a spare parts subsidy and protecting them from illegal payments while they are on streets or as they extend their relevant documents.

Such measures may help the survival of the already dying public transportations, which now also supports the lives of more than a million including public transportation crews, operators and members of their families.

In the short term, the governor needs to hurry up and make up his mind. Public tariff pricing is not a complicated issue. The governor can not satisfy everyone in his decision, but one thing is sure: Be faster Bapak governor.

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