J

upri, a 73-year-old fisherman, left his room at the Marunda low-cost apartments in North Jakarta, only two months after he was relocated to the apartments from his home in Pasar Ikan in West Jakarta, in April last year.

Jupri said he was unable to make ends meet at the Marunda apartments, which are located 25 kilometers from the Pasar Ikan berth where he usually docks his boat.

“It is time-consuming to go back and forth,” he told The Jakarta Post recently.

Jupri moved into his son’s apartment in Kapuk Muara, West Jakarta, which is nearer to Pasar Ikan. However, as the room was too cramped to accommodate him and his wife, 68-year-old Rumsi, they eventually returned to the ruins of Pasar Ikan and erected a makeshift hut there.

“It is okay to live here without electricity and piped water. At least, I can continue sailing and earning money,” he said.

According to Jupri, Marunda is a nightmare for a fisherman like him, as it is too far from his workplace.

“While I could not find another job I still needed to pay many extra costs, including apartment rent, water and electricity bills,” said Jupri, who has been a fisherman all his working life.

The administration only foots the bills for the first three months of living in the apartments. After that, the newly relocated tenants have to pay from their own pocket.

To date, the city administration has relocated around 14,000 families to apartments in 23 locations. Most of them have been relocated far from their previous homes, mostly on riverbanks.

In order to help the families to adapt to the new apartment environment, the administration also provides assistance schemes, including educational funding, the so-called Jakarta Smart Card (KJP), health insurance, free school buses, free transportation on Transjakarta buses and various staple food subsidies.

However, many of the newly relocated households fail to cope with vertical living. Around 6,000 families have reportedly faced difficulty in paying the rents, ranging from Rp 180,000 (US$11.25) to Rp 280,000 per month.

Many residents, mostly working in the informal sector as workers at nearby markets, factories or as street vendors, complain that their new homes are too far from their workplaces.

Another resident of Pesakih low-cost apartment in West Jakarta, Darwati, 40, asked the administration to help her find a new job.

Darwati, whose husband is a construction worker, said her husband’s income had decreased as he could not find jobs around the apartments.

“We hope the administration could provide us with alternatives, to find new jobs or equip us with new skills,” she said.

Jakarta Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises Agency (UMKM) head Irwandi claimed his agency had provided the new tenants with various life-skill training courses as well as equipment assistance such as food carts and vendor display cases.

“We have trained dozens of women in making batik and embroidery in Marunda apartments and Cipinang Besar Selatan in East Jakarta,” he said.

Irwandi said after the training, the agency in cooperation with the Jakarta chapter of the Council for National Handicrafts Indonesia (Dekranasda), would hire them to make batik.

“We provide all the equipment and materials and we will pay for their products,” he said.

He added that the products were distributed to bazaars and Dekranasda outlets in several places.

Irwandi said his agency planned to conduct more training in three other apartments — Daan Mogot in West Jakarta and Pinus Elok and Jatinegara, both in East Jakarta.

“We also allocate around Rp 300 millions in grants for new tenants who propose to get food carts or display cases,” he said.

He said the vendors, however, needed to apply for the grants.

Irwandi said his agency realized that many new tenants had a variety of jobs before relocating. “We are now cooperating with the Manpower and Transmigration Agency to conduct other training sessions,” he said, adding that no fixed programs had been set up so far.