City to evaluate building permits in Kemang

JAKARTA: The city administration plans to check the permits of all buildings in Kemang, South Jakarta, as there have been many building regulation violations.

"We will evaluate the permits of commercial buildings in the area. If we find any violations, we will restore the building to its original state and function," said Jakarta Governor Fauzi Bowo on Monday.

"We will not make any changes in residential areas," Fauzi said, as quoted by vivanews.com.

Fauzi's statement was at odds with initial reports made by his subordinate Wiriyatmoko, head of the City Spatial Planning Agency, who said previously the administration planned to turn Kemang into a "modern kampung" without high-rise buildings. According to the plan, businesses will be legalized and the area will be developed in a similar way to Kuta in Bali.

Head of South Jakarta's building monitoring and control agency, Widiyo Dwiyono, said the managements of 1,690 buildings in Kemang had disobeyed the agency's regulations.

The building owners, he said, applied for permits to build residential housings, but ended up converting them into commercial buildings so they could run as a business. -JP