City to move on projects to create employment

Tifa Asrianti, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta  

In anticipation of a looming global financial crisis and mass layoffs, the city administration says it will push forward several labor-intensive projects. 

Governor Fauzi Bowo said his administration would expedite projects that create employment, in a bid to soften the blow to Jakarta from the economic downturn. 

"We will accelerate the budget disbursement and start projects such as river dredging, subway construction and school operational funds. It will be a pro-poor policy because it will create jobs," he said. 

"The city budget may only be 10 percent of the regional domestic product, but it is still the economic motor. So once it's disbursed, we expect the work to start rolling in." 

The city administration is planning to dredge Jakarta's rivers and waterways to tackle flooding. 

One of the projects is the dredging of 12 waterways, slated for completion in December. The Rp 23 billion (US$2.4 million) project will dredge 243,322 cubic meters of garbage out of the waterways, which vary in length from 467 meters to 3,533 meters. 

"We expect to sign a contract with the tender winner by the end of this month," said Budi Widiantoro, deputy head of the city's public works agency. 

State-of-the-art dredging equipment will be brought in from the Netherlands to dredge the Ancol and Mati canals and the Pademangan River. 

"With the equipment already at Tanjung Priok Port, we can start dredging the canals in November," Fauzi said. 

Besides dredging minor waterways, the city administration will next year dredge the 13 major rivers crisscrossing the city, using a Rp 1.2 trillion loan from the World Bank. 

Mochamad Tauchid Tjakra Amidjaja, the city's transportation agency head, said his office would try to expedite land acquisition for the subway project, expected to help ease Jakarta's notoriously atrocious traffic jams. 

The administration says it will complete the land acquisition in 2009 and continue with the subway construction in 2010. 

"The land acquisition and construction can be done simultaneously. We will use Rp 22 billion to acquire 7,000 square meters of land near Lebak Bulus Terminal in South Jakarta to build the subway depot and final station. We're still in discussions with the South Jakarta mayor," Tauchid said. 

Fauzi was upbeat about the projects' prospects of creating enough jobs. 

"We will also prepare for mass layoffs in industries affected by the global financial turmoil. We have asked businesses to find alternatives to such layoffs," he said.