T

he city administration has announced that it will not issue new permits to developers that have not met the obligation to build social and general facilities as stipulated in regulations.

Jakarta Deputy Governor Basuki '€œAhok'€ Tjahaja Purnama told reporters at City Hall on Friday that in a bid to increase awareness among developers, his administration would not issue land-use permits (SIPPTs) before the required social and general facilities, such as roads, sidewalks and parks, had been built.

'€œDevelopers also cannot begin selling their properties before a technical, architecture, urban and development advisory team declares that their properties comply with regulations,'€ he said.

Ahok said the step was being taken as many developers did not fulfill their obligation to build the required facilities and hand them over to the city administration.

The administration issued Gubernatorial Regulation No. 48/2012 on general and social facility inspection procedures and Gubernatorial Instruction No. 197/2001 on the handing over of general and social facilities by permit holders to the city administration. However, the regulations do not stipulate any punishment for companies that do not comply.

The head of the Bureau of Spatial Planning and the Environment, Vera Revina Sari, said only 50 of 2,000 SIPPT holders had met the obligation on social and general facilities in 2013.

'€œMeanwhile, only 38 developers met the obligation in 2012 and 71 developers in 2011,'€ she said.

Vera claimed that the city administration had been urging developers to hand over such facilities since the 1970s.

She said, however, that facilities in the 1990s did not have a planning map, so the administration needed to make on-site inspections. '€œWe face obstacles in enforcement,'€ she said.

She said the administration would also be stricter in issuing building permits (IMBs) and function worthiness certificates (SLFs) for developers that had not built the required facilities.

Ahok said many major developers had not met the obligation. '€œHowever, we cannot sanction them as there is no legal basis for that,'€ he said.

Ahok said the restriction had prompted complaints from developers, who claimed the city administration was hampering development.

The secretary of the Jakarta office of the Indonesian Real Estate Developers Association, Amran Nukman, welcomed the administration'€™s move, but questioned its feasibility.

'€œThey urge us to hand over the facilities, but are they ready to take care of the facilities?'€ he asked.

Amran said developers wanted to build properties and sell them as fast as possible, as well as hand over the facilities.

'€œWe also do not want to take care of the facilities indefinitely while we have other projects to handle,'€ he said.