Having lived in Indonesia for a good many years it has been with amazement that I have watched the rapid expansion of the number of malls and by extension shopping venues and space available to regular Jakartans...Yet, the phenomenon does not seem to be restricted to Indonesia. Recent visits to Singapore, Thailand, and Malaysia have shown that they are no slackers on this front either. Singapore in its defense has always been a shopping mecca but with the emergence of Jakarta, Kuala Lumpur, Bangkok, and other cities in between this mecca status is slowly but surely being eroded by these other upstarts.
A recent personal survey of mall possibilities in Jakarta highlighted the tough decision on where to go or where to start the mall crawl, a more social version of that great Australian past time of the pub crawl! It was determined that even in a month of Sundays it might not be possible to take in all of the shopping possibilities in Jakarta and the surrounding satellite cities of Tangerang, Bekasi, Bogor, and the not so far away Bandung.
As a social comment, who said there was a financial crisis in Indonesia? The disposable income of the upper middle class and the elite have returned to all intents and purposes pre-financial crises levels. This might not be borne out by financial statistics or data from the central bank or other institutions but a non-scientific approach of wandering around a mall or two looking at the trade being done in the big and exclusive brand shops like Gucci, Versace, Chanel, and the like would suggest that there is plenty of money around. In terms of official data it might be interesting to look at savings levels and see whether Indonesians are saving or just simply spending. Even more interesting would be the credit card debt levels...
But back to the phenomenon...there is so much underutilized shopping space that it beggars belief how future shopping developments could be justified either from a financial or spatial planning perspective. Yet, there are plans for even more shopping space...beats the hell out of me!!!
I will endeavor to find the relevant data and update this post over the next couple of days....
15 August 2007
05 August 2007
The Immigration Experience...
It is that time of year again...the KITAS is about to expire and the fun & games are about to begin. I always hear that Indonesia is working to make the process easier, user friendly, and quick usually this relates to facilitating investment. So, perhaps I need to make a business style capital investment and just maybe the process will be oh so much smoother - it is good to have dreams.
The process is already a little more complicated than years past as I need to get out of the country in the interim period between when my current KITAS expires and the new KITAS is ready. Any long-term resident, and perhaps some new arrivals too, understand that where there is a 'will' there is likely to be someone who can make the 'way'. The official way that this works is there is a temporary KITAS extension period that can be approved by the Head of each Immigration Office and this would seem to be a discretionary power. The unofficial way that this can be worked out I will leave to your imagination.
Immigration Agents, Immigration Officers, and you! The use of an immigration agent to do the leg work and get the job done is standard practice but it really is a case of caveat emptor or buyer beware, simply the buyer needs to be aware. Immigration agents are a dime a dozen but quality is as varied as cost and service levels are not necessarily related to cost. But more important than any of these considerations is honesty! Honesty in the sense of being upfront about the official options that are available rather than take the easy path of making illicit payments to grease the wheels and get the documents required. For some this may be just another cost of doing business in Indonesia or 'just the way it is'. Yet, as a matter of principle if you continue to feed the monster it is just going to get hungrier and greedier each time. This is apart from the fact that it is just plain wrong.
It is amazing what a few calls can do to the person in charge...I needed to extend my KITAS for a month to head overseas for a couple of days...Various quotes saw the fee negotiated through agents to around IDR 3 million for an Entry / Exit permit which usually only sets back the happy traveler IDR 200,000 back down to the legitimate fee of IDR 200,000...congratulations to the immigration office and officers involved, you have done yourselves proud! I do not know whether this good fortune will extend to the full 12-month extension but you cannot win 'em all, right?
The moral of this story is if you can do it yourself, then you probably should...agents only complicate the process for exorbitant fees that I only now realize are exorbitant because I have finally bothered to find out what the official fees are for certain documents...for those of you out there that do not know - the official fees depending on what documents you need will not exceed IDR 1.5 million...the last agent I paid to facilitate the process demanded IDR 4.5 million...even assuming the agent greases the wheels to get the job done (or to spread the good fortune) there is still somewhere between IDR 2 million and IDR 3 million profit...a good income earner if I do say so myself!!!
Updates to follow as I negotiate the process....
The process is already a little more complicated than years past as I need to get out of the country in the interim period between when my current KITAS expires and the new KITAS is ready. Any long-term resident, and perhaps some new arrivals too, understand that where there is a 'will' there is likely to be someone who can make the 'way'. The official way that this works is there is a temporary KITAS extension period that can be approved by the Head of each Immigration Office and this would seem to be a discretionary power. The unofficial way that this can be worked out I will leave to your imagination.
Immigration Agents, Immigration Officers, and you! The use of an immigration agent to do the leg work and get the job done is standard practice but it really is a case of caveat emptor or buyer beware, simply the buyer needs to be aware. Immigration agents are a dime a dozen but quality is as varied as cost and service levels are not necessarily related to cost. But more important than any of these considerations is honesty! Honesty in the sense of being upfront about the official options that are available rather than take the easy path of making illicit payments to grease the wheels and get the documents required. For some this may be just another cost of doing business in Indonesia or 'just the way it is'. Yet, as a matter of principle if you continue to feed the monster it is just going to get hungrier and greedier each time. This is apart from the fact that it is just plain wrong.
It is amazing what a few calls can do to the person in charge...I needed to extend my KITAS for a month to head overseas for a couple of days...Various quotes saw the fee negotiated through agents to around IDR 3 million for an Entry / Exit permit which usually only sets back the happy traveler IDR 200,000 back down to the legitimate fee of IDR 200,000...congratulations to the immigration office and officers involved, you have done yourselves proud! I do not know whether this good fortune will extend to the full 12-month extension but you cannot win 'em all, right?
The moral of this story is if you can do it yourself, then you probably should...agents only complicate the process for exorbitant fees that I only now realize are exorbitant because I have finally bothered to find out what the official fees are for certain documents...for those of you out there that do not know - the official fees depending on what documents you need will not exceed IDR 1.5 million...the last agent I paid to facilitate the process demanded IDR 4.5 million...even assuming the agent greases the wheels to get the job done (or to spread the good fortune) there is still somewhere between IDR 2 million and IDR 3 million profit...a good income earner if I do say so myself!!!
Updates to follow as I negotiate the process....
The Jakarta Gubernatorial Elections
The following part was written in the days before the election...
With the campaign period winding down and public debates by the candidates restricted to stage-managed media events now is a good a time as any to reflect on what the future holds for most Jakartans after the election is concluded and the new Governor installed. The candidates are chalk and cheese in terms of political experience with the incumbent Deputy Governor, now looking to be Governor in his own right, being a bureaucrat most of his professional life. On the other hand, there is a retired police officer who reached the pinnacles of his chosen profession now looking to branch out into the political field.
If the election was to be decided only on party support then the incumbent Deputy Governor is a certain winner. Indonesia is no different from any other democracy in that it is not always the best policies that get you elected to office. Yet, it is worth looking at the candidates' policies to see what the future holds. However, considering the level of apathy that abounds in the community where in some surveys the best estimate says that there may be only 35% eligible voter turnout. This means that the next Governor of Jakarta could be elected to office with as little as 17.6% of registered voters. It is always interesting to see a democracy where people for so long did not have the freedom to vote as they choose, struggle to get that right, and then once they do not exercise it. This is an argument or discussion for another blog entry on another day.
Back to the policies of the candidates. As is the case with most politicians their policies are big on rhetoric and somewhat skint on details. However, this said, at least one of the candidates was prepared to enter into a social contract with civil society on promises like reducing unemployment, reducing poverty, reducing flooding, and a number of other key issues for Jakarta. It would be interesting to see whether or not he would want to be held to this social contract in the future, a sort of live by the contract die by the contract venture. There are serious issues facing Jakarta and Jakartans into the future - unemployment is one, the others though are equally and if not more important, such as generating capital investment, reducing pollution which in turn may reduce flooding, improving general law enforcement, reducing corruption and illegal payments in the public sector and public services, transportation infrastructure, and reducing poverty, to name but a few of the challenges. I guess only time will tell on this front...
The following is written after the completion of the election process...
The incumbent Deputy Governor took the vote albeit not by the sizable margin predicted. More interesting and promising for the future was that all the dire predictions of minimal voter turnout did not materialize with some estimates suggesting a turnout of 75% of registered voters. Despite the smaller than expected margin of victory it is clear that the Governor-elect has a mandate to govern. Hopefully, with the support of some 19 political parties this will translate into effective government. However, the winds of change are ever-present as political parties are all too often populist in nature and chop and change course at a heartbeat in pursuit of greater public support.
Life goes on!
With the campaign period winding down and public debates by the candidates restricted to stage-managed media events now is a good a time as any to reflect on what the future holds for most Jakartans after the election is concluded and the new Governor installed. The candidates are chalk and cheese in terms of political experience with the incumbent Deputy Governor, now looking to be Governor in his own right, being a bureaucrat most of his professional life. On the other hand, there is a retired police officer who reached the pinnacles of his chosen profession now looking to branch out into the political field.
If the election was to be decided only on party support then the incumbent Deputy Governor is a certain winner. Indonesia is no different from any other democracy in that it is not always the best policies that get you elected to office. Yet, it is worth looking at the candidates' policies to see what the future holds. However, considering the level of apathy that abounds in the community where in some surveys the best estimate says that there may be only 35% eligible voter turnout. This means that the next Governor of Jakarta could be elected to office with as little as 17.6% of registered voters. It is always interesting to see a democracy where people for so long did not have the freedom to vote as they choose, struggle to get that right, and then once they do not exercise it. This is an argument or discussion for another blog entry on another day.
Back to the policies of the candidates. As is the case with most politicians their policies are big on rhetoric and somewhat skint on details. However, this said, at least one of the candidates was prepared to enter into a social contract with civil society on promises like reducing unemployment, reducing poverty, reducing flooding, and a number of other key issues for Jakarta. It would be interesting to see whether or not he would want to be held to this social contract in the future, a sort of live by the contract die by the contract venture. There are serious issues facing Jakarta and Jakartans into the future - unemployment is one, the others though are equally and if not more important, such as generating capital investment, reducing pollution which in turn may reduce flooding, improving general law enforcement, reducing corruption and illegal payments in the public sector and public services, transportation infrastructure, and reducing poverty, to name but a few of the challenges. I guess only time will tell on this front...
The following is written after the completion of the election process...
The incumbent Deputy Governor took the vote albeit not by the sizable margin predicted. More interesting and promising for the future was that all the dire predictions of minimal voter turnout did not materialize with some estimates suggesting a turnout of 75% of registered voters. Despite the smaller than expected margin of victory it is clear that the Governor-elect has a mandate to govern. Hopefully, with the support of some 19 political parties this will translate into effective government. However, the winds of change are ever-present as political parties are all too often populist in nature and chop and change course at a heartbeat in pursuit of greater public support.
Life goes on!
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