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Anies claims successes, pressing issues remain
Jakarta Governor Anies Baswedan has claimed scores of achievements by his administration during Jakarta’s 492nd anniversary celebration even amid the many issues that need to be addressed to support the capital city’s development
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span>Jakarta Governor Anies Baswedan has claimed scores of achievements by his administration during Jakarta’s 492nd anniversary celebration even amid the many issues that need to be addressed to support the capital city’s development.
In his speech during a special plenary meeting held to commemorate the city’s anniversary on Saturday, Anies boasted of a list of recognitions Jakarta had received since Dec. 15 last year.
He said with pride that the city administration had managed to maintain two unqualified opinions (WTP) from the Supreme Audit Agency (BPK) for the city’s 2017 and 2018 financial reports. He attributed the achievement to the implementation of good governance and a commitment to corruption eradication.
The best audit grade from the BPK was the first one the administration obtained after four years.
In regards to this year’s anniversary that has the theme, “The New Face of Jakarta”, Anies claimed several innovations had been made to facilitate residents, such as the launch of the e-Jiwa, DBDKlim and JakTrack health service applications.
He also highlighted the operation of phase 1 of MRT Jakarta, which was officially launched in March, along with the improved integration of different modes of transportation and better public facilities like sidewalks and
footbridges.
In addition, he mentioned in his speech that Jakarta has been nominated, along with Kigali in Rwanda and Pune in India, for the 2020 Sustainable Transport Award, an international competition judging the implementation of sustainable transportation projects.
Despite the claims, Anies also acknowledged that the social gap remained an issue in the city to be resolved.
He said the construction of various projects in Jakarta must also bring equality to all residents.
He expressed hope that the development of the phase 2 of MRT Jakarta and other private projects would boost the city’s economic growth rate to 6.4 percent this year, an increase from last year’s 5.93 percent.
“To realize the city’s priorities and progress, the Jakarta administration cannot work alone. What’s most important is the solidarity among city leaders from public representative institutions, security institutions and law enforcement,” he said in his speech to City Council on Saturday.
Amid the claims of success, Home Affairs Minister Tjahjo Kumolo put his attention on the city’s unused funding (SiLPA) last year, pointing out the slow budget disbursement to the administration.
According to Cabinet Secretariat’s official website, setkab.go.id, Jakarta’s 2018 unused funds totaled Rp 12.17 trillion (US$861.71 million), the highest among all provinces. The city recorded an 82 percent budget use last year.
Tjahjo urged the city administration to conduct a thorough evaluation of planning in the city budget and also to make sure that the planned programs ran well under the supervision of the City Council.
“I want to remind the administration that it needs to be careful in corruption-prone sectors related to budget planning, grants, social aid funds and tax revenues. This must be our joint commitment to develop transparent good governance for the public interest,” Tjahjo said.
Council Speaker Prasetyo Edi Marsudi said the unused funds showed that the working units did not work hard enough to boost their performance. He claimed that there are officials who work based on the local idiom, “Asal bapak senang” (as long as the boss is happy), meaning they would only give good reports to superiors without really making progress in their jobs.
“Their performances are not optimal. I observed it from the budget use,” he said after the plenary meeting. “I will address this in the next forums.”
Prasetyo also urged the city to accelerate the development of phase 2 of MRT Jakarta to help ease the city’s traffic and add to the public transportation network following the warm welcome for phase 1 of the project.
Ashraf Ali, the Golkar Party’s faction head in City Council, said that aside from physical development, the city administration should also pay more attention to the spiritual and mental development of the residents. Such developments are vital as they would play a role in residents’ discipline and environment awareness while keeping the city in order.
“It will also encourage young people to actively participate in the development,” he said.
