Within less than three months, Jakartans will be going to the polling stations to cast their vote on whom they trust to be their next leaders. Regardless of whether you’re an eligible voter or not, the election undeniably will affect the lives of every single individual who lives and works in the Big Durian.
Hopefully it isn’t wishful thinking to ask Jakartans to look beyond the surface, which by now has been marred with rule of mob and sparked a call for trial over alleged blasphemy charges by one of the gubernatorial candidates.
Moving past that, let’s get down to the nitty-gritty of finding the best man for the job by analyzing the ideas and beliefs each candidate stands for. Considering the significance of Jakarta as the biggest, richest and most vibrant province in Indonesia, and not to mention how its last governor had gone on to be country’s president, whoever wins the title of DKI 1 will bear some major responsibilities on his shoulders.
That’s why we think it’s important for Jakartans to get to know their possible future leaders. Here we’ve put together profiles and campaign themes of the three pairs of candidates, as provided by each team to the Jakarta General Elections Commission. Read carefully – you’ll be amazed to realize that despite their different approaches and personalities, some of them do share similar end goals.
1. Agus Harimurti Yudhoyono & Sylviana Murni
Vision: Their ‘Jakarta 2022’ aims to create a more developed, safe, just and prosperous Jakarta by 2022.
Mission: The pair then translated their vision into five missions, namely by pushing for development, security, social justice, welfare, environment, convenience and dignity.
Work Programmes:
Development: Pushing for development based on the general spatial plan; increasing quantity and quality of public transportation; providing residents with better sanitation and potable water; improving telecommunication infrastructure; improving quality of bureaucracy.
Security: Improving quality and function of the drainage system; improving the quality of parks and open spaces in residential neighbourhoods; preventing and combating crime.
Social justice: Increasing the income level of the lower middle class to lessen the gap between the rich and the poor; improving women and children’s access to health, education and public facilities; preventing violence against women and children; supporting micro, small and medium enterprises.
Welfare: Boosting Jakarta’s ranking on the World Happiness Index; improving quantity and quality of health services; improving the quality of health workers; improving the quality of teachers; improving the quality of bureaucracy.
Environment: Increasing the amount of green space; improving the quality of waste management; promoting urban farming.
Convenience and dignity: Improving ways to handle traffic and congestion; providing facilities for disabled persons in public facilities; improving access and facilities for the elderly; improving quantity and quality of infrastructure for pedestrians, bicyclists and motorcyclists.
2. Basuki Tjahaja Purnama & Djarot Syaiful Hidayat
Vision: To create Jakarta as an urban display that is modern, neat, humane and focused on comprehensive human development under clean, transparent and professional leadership.
Mission: Working toward clean governance, transparency and an attitude to serve the people.
Ensuring that residents get access to good health, education and living environment; securing food prices; providing good public transportation; providing work opportunities that lead to better quality of life, and in the end, improving Jakarta’s ranking on the World Happiness Index.
Creating strong and globally competent human resources. Promoting an evolving city plan that keeps up with external changes in support of economic development, environmental sustainability and the sociocultural aspects of its residents. Building a modern city with world-class technology and infrastructure.
Work Programmes:
Bureaucracy reform: Simplifying procedures for permits, licenses and identity documents; creating an integrated database for all permits; pushing for transparency in rotation, mutation and demotion of civil servants; pushing for quicker and better quality of response; improving budget transparency by creating an IT system that is easily accessible by the public.
Education: Providing free, quality education for 12 years in keeping with the national law; continuing the cashless provision of Kartu Jakarta Pintar (Smart Jakarta Card) for lower income families to better target its use; extending scholarships for students from lower income families to attend universities; improving the livelihood of teachers.
Health: Providing total health coverage for lower income residents; tripling the number of intensive care unit facilities for newborn babies; adding 100 more ambulance vehicles, free of charge and with maximum wait time of 15 minutes.
Economy: Providing food security; pushing for public-private partnerships; revitalizing traditional wet markets to meet global standards.
Flood management: Completing the development of 17 new reservoirs; doubling the capacity of water pumps especially in flood-prone areas; increasing the number of infiltration holes and biopores.
Urban planning: Creating 50,000 new low-cost apartment units for post-relocation residents; switching all streetlights to the more efficient LED.
Transportation: Completing Phase 1 of the MRT, which is expected to start operating in 2019; launching Phase 2 of the HI Roundabout – East Ancol and Ujung Menteng – Kembangan routes; revitalizing public buses, integrating their routes with the Transjakarta.
Technology: Providing free wireless Internet access in public areas; supporting investment in fiber optic technology; providing co-working space for IT startups in support of the digital economy sector.
Tourism and culture: Developing Kepulauan Seribu as a tourist destination, boosting all the supporting infrastructure; revitalizing Kota Tua (Old Town) as a main tourist attraction; allowing art performances at government offices on the weekend.
Social: Improving accessibility and facilities for the disabled in public areas; adding the number of education facilities for students with disabilities.
Environment: Creating a comprehensive and integrated waste management system; employing zero waste system at all government-owned low-cost apartment buildings.
3. Anies Baswedan & Sandiaga Uno
Vision: Jakarta as a developed and civilized city where all citizens are entitled to justice and social welfare.
Mission: By ways of promoting people-friendly and nurturing leadership, to empower Jakarta residents who are then able to drive effective bureaucracy, maintain stability and affordability of food prices, improve quality of health, education and culture, as well as resolve social problems; promote sustainable development through integrative urban planning which takes into account social and environmental aspects; increase social welfare by creating more jobs, boost infrastructure spending and solve problems related to increasing traffic and mobility demands.
Work Programmes:
– Maintain stable food prices;
– Create more jobs;
– Establish a monitoring and priority system to better manage local budgetary expenditure;
– Push for an integrated development that brings together human resources and physical infrastructure;
– Conduct good governance based on transparency, accountability and efficiency;
– Tackle Jakarta’s longstanding problems, which include among others flooding and lack of clean water, traffic congestion and poor waste management.
