Boy killed in Transjakarta bus accident in S. Jakarta

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A 10-year-old boy was killed on Friday after being hit by a Transjakarta bus on Jl. Warung Buncit, South Jakarta, which led to a traffic standstill for a few hours as residents blocked the road.

Adam Soki was hit by the bus serving the Dukuh Atas–Ragunan route, when he was crossing the road at 11:35 a.m. He died on impact.

A witness, Yono, said that the boy was trying to catch up with his mother, who had crossed the road ahead of him, when the fatal accident occurred.

Angry mobs then attacked the bus, bombarded it with stones and wrote some graffiti which said: “Starting tomorrow, busway [Transjakarta] is not allowed to operate”.

The traffic police’s law enforcement unit chief, Adj. Sr. Comr. Sudarmanto, said that the driver, Wawan Setiawan, 33, could not stop the bus in time as the boy was too close to it. “The driver was taken to the police station for questioning,” Sudarmanto said.

Transjakarta spokesperson Sri Ulina said her company would assist Wawan in any legal proceedings. Sri also said that the executives of the company expressed their deepest condolences to Adam’s family. “We are very sorry. Of course no one wanted this to happen,” she said, adding the company would pay for the cost of the boy’s funeral and compensate the family with an amount of money.

Several accidents have previously occurred along the route, including one in February 2011, which claimed the life of M. Rizki Firmansyah, 9.

Sri said indiscipline was the main factor leading to Transjakarta’s bus accidents, as pedestrians jaywalked across the exclusive busway lane.

Sri said that Transjakarta and the Jakarta Transportation Agency would heighten the busway’s separator to prevent other vehicles from using the way and pedestrians from crossing the road by cutting through it. (JP/aml)