Hundreds of activists and students took to the streets of Jakarta on Friday afternoon as part of a historic global climate strike that kicked off on Friday protesting inaction on the climate crisis and demanding that governments take clear measures to mitigate environmental impacts.

University and school students and members of about 50 civil groups gathered and marched from the Cut Meutia Mosque in Central Jakarta to Jakarta City Hall before concluding their protests at Aspirasi Park in the National Monument (Monas) area just across from the Presidential Palace.

The protestors were among millions of people from all over the world taking part in a global climate strike scheduled to take place from Sept. 20 to 27. As many as 4,638 events in 139 countries are expected to be part of the movement, Young Swedish environmental activist Greta Thunberg, who inspired the movement, said on her Twitter account on Tuesday.

In Jakarta, protesters yelled and raised their posters urging the central government and regional administrations to take the climate crisis more seriously and to implement proper policies to address it.

People of various ages and backgrounds joined the long march on Friday voicing their concerns over the future of the Earth for the younger generations.

One of the protesters was 16-year-old Sofia Rahmah, a home-schooled student who decided to join the strike after seeing the call to action on Instagram. The 11th grader marched together with her friends hoping that their participation would contribute to a significant change.

“We are the generation that will continue living on this Earth; we need to get up and do something,” she said during the march.

She said she takes the issue personally, as being someone with asthma the current poor air quality blanketing the capital city chokes her.

Students from Misykat al Anwar Islamic boarding school in Bogor, West Java, also took part in the strike. One of them was 15-year-old Kinanti Gyurit Wening who said that she and her classmates went to Jakarta after receiving permission from the school’s director who often discusses environmental issues with the students.

She said the main point of the strike was to urge the government to realize that its actions are key to raising awareness and mitigating climate change, and that residents would soon follow suit.

“We don’t have a spare planet to live on. Where else do we live but on this Earth?” she asked.

Kinanti said although she only just started to learn more about climate change, she wished the government would make policies to use cleaner energy.

“I want cities without pollution so we can walk without covering our mouth and nose,” she said.

Nada Zharfania Zuhaira, 21, and 17 of her university friends studying environmental engineering at the Bandung Institute of Technology (ITB) came all the way from Bandung, in West Java, in the morning to take part in the strike.

She said she was inspired by Thunberg and has followed her activism since her speech before world leaders at the COP 24 summit in Poland last year.

She said university students like her should not wait until they graduate to start speaking up about issues. “We can speak up according to our field of knowledge.”

She said that according to Indonesia’s Nationally Determined Contribution (NDC) document, the government already realized that land conversion and forest fires contributed the most greenhouse gases, at 63 percent of the total. According to the same document, the government pledged to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 26 percent by 2020 and 41 percent by 2030.

“The government should be more aggressive and show a stronger commitment to mitigating climate change,” Nada said.

Greenpeace Indonesia climate and energy campaigner Satrio Swandiko said climate crisis issues must not be overlooked by the government or anyone as Indonesia would bear the brunt of any impact.

He said that as the world’s largest archipelago with a coastline 81,000 kilometers long, Indonesia was vulnerable to climate change, particularly the rising sea levels that would impact all residents.

Satrio also said the government should respond to the climate strike and urged it to start the transition from fossil fuels to renewable energy and prevent forest fires in Sumatra and Kalimantan, rather than arbitrarily handling the current crisis.

The climate strike also took place in 12 other cities in Indonesia.

In Denpasar, hundreds of people, mostly students but also some foreigners, circled the Bajra Sandhi monument carrying banners and posters calling for awareness and action on climate change.

One of the protesters, Kadek Kencana Putra, 14, a student of SMP 2 Denpasar junior high school, said the use of plastic also contributed to climate change. "I want to send a message to everybody: Please reduce the use of plastic. We have to take care of this Earth," he said.

In Bengkulu, dozens of people of Gerakan Menolak Punah (Refusing to Go Extinct Movement) also staged a climate strike demanding the government let go of its dependency on coal as the main national electricity source and start to transition to renewable energy to mitigate the worsening climate crisis.

At the Titik Nol (Kilometer Zero) area of Yogyakarta, hundreds of people also took part in the climate strike urging people and the government to be mindful of the environment to mitigate climate change.

The Environment and Forestry Ministry climate change control director general Ruandha Agung Sugardiman claimed the government had shown its commitment to mitigating climate change by reducing its greenhouse emissions by ratifying the 2016 Paris Agreement.

“The government has ratified the Paris Agreement into Law No. 16/2016, showing our commitment to lowering the country’s greenhouse gases,” he said.

— Ni Komang Erviani from Bali and Bambang Muryanto from Yogyakarta contributed to this story.

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