Rules were made to be broken.
This saying is popular among students who rebel against school discipline. Bigger boys may breach bigger rules, causing more serious damages.
This case has profound consequences for Jakarta, where some “big boys” make their own rules, in the form of bylaws, but consider these rules unenforceable.
The air pollution control bylaw and a gubernatorial decree on smoke-free zones are among these neglected rules.
The bylaw designates seven different zones where smoking is prohibited: public transportation, health-care buildings, schools, children’s areas, places of worship, offices, malls and transportation
terminals.
Of the seven zones, only the first five are deemed completely smoke-free zones, while offices and public spaces are considered partially smoke-free because people are still allowed to smoke, but only in designated smoking areas.
Violations are punishable with a six-month prison sentence or fines of up to Rp 50 million (US$4,190).
Does this get smokers to move on to the patch? Well, not quite.
Beyond the drawing board, the bylaw becomes meaningless.
No one has been imprisoned so far, and only Rp 20,000 fines have been imposed in a few random raids.
BPLHD head of law enforcement Ridwan Panjaitan said civil service investigators assigned to enforce the bylaws were hesitant about punishing violators.
This results in a half-hearted implementation of the bylaw, which is not surprising.
YLKI published its July survey about the implementation of the smoking ban on public transportation and found violations in 89 percent of 549 public buses and minivans surveyed.
Currently, BPLHD is implementing another new policy on air pollution control. It is raising
awareness by conducting vehicle emission tests.
It is not clear when the city will start to impose sanctions as the mechanism has not been determined.
Another toothless bylaw is the public order bylaw, which stipulates that people who throw or pile garbage on roads, sidewalks, rivers, green strips, parks or other public places face fines of between Rp 100,000 and Rp 2 million or between 10 and 60 days in prison.
Governor Fauzi Bowo, once again, gave an excuse for not enforcing the bylaw: It could not be enforced fairly as most of the perpetrators were low-income residents.
Rather than treat littering as a criminal act, the city seems to choose the alternative: heavy annual floods exacerbated by clogged drains.
Raids were conducted this year in PGC Cililitan and Kramat Jati traditional market in East Jakarta as well as at Kalideres bus station in West Jakarta. But then again, these were mere formalities.
The public order bylaw covers other aspects that are often ignored, including pedestrian use of crosswalks and footbridges. Pedestrians have died because dashing across the road through heavy traffic seemed the easier option.
Ucok SKY Khadafi, a senior researcher at the Indonesian Forum for Budget Transparency, said city councilors were not serious about enforcing bylaws.
“They push through bylaws just to get bigger allocations from the annual budget,” he said.
According to FITRA, the 2009 budget to draft a bylaw was Rp 900 million, higher than in 2010, when Rp 500 million to Rp 700 million will be allocated to draft a bylaw.
Five bylaws were passed this year. Next year, the city council plans to pass 12 more. Implementing these bylaws is another issue.
So smokers, keep on puffing. We can’t get enough of your second-hand smoke.
Residents, continue using rivers as your trash cans. What’s Jakarta without a flood?
