The Poor Are Not Optimally Helped

Kompas/Totok Wijayanto

Dwellers of semi-permanent buildings along the railway tracks in Kampung Bandan area, North Jakarta, with the background of multi-storied residential buildings on Saturday (19/6/2021).

JAKARTA, KOMPAS — Ahead of its anniversary celebration on Tuesday (22/6/2021), the Jakarta provincial administration is still struggling to cope with the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic. Since the beginning of the pandemic in March 2020, Jakarta has been responsive and firm in its efforts in overcome its impact.

However, health and socioeconomic problems have not improved as the pandemic enters its second year. The increase in the number of poor people is one of the impacts of the pandemic that requires a special attention.

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Tikno (62), a former janitor at a hospital in Slipi, West Jakarta, for example, was upset because his name was not included on the list of people who were eligible to receive direct cash assistance (BST) of Rp 300,000 (US$20.5) per month, which has been disbursed to the poor since early 2021.

“I can\'t get the BST fund because of my occupation stated in the e-KTP (e-identification card) as a pensioner. In fact, I used to be a contract janitor,” he said on Monday (14/6).

Tikno is just an example of a poor person in Jakarta. He said that the mistake in his occupation status occurred when he changed his regular KTP to an e-KTP. The population official had mistakenly entered his employment status in the population data. He was listed as a retired employee, instead of unemployed because his work contract had been terminated. With that status, he is not classified as poor.

As a result, in his old age and amid the severe impact of the Covid-19 pandemic, Tikno was like being hit by a disaster twice. He is afraid of contracting Covid-19 and has difficulty accessing basic rights, such as food, because he was not included in the people who were eligible to receive the government’s social assistance.

KOMPAS/RADITYA HELABUMI

Jakara deputy governor Ahmad Riza Patria.

Jakara deputy governor Ahmad Riza Patria said in a special interview at Jakarta City Hall on Wednesday (16/6 ) that the pandemic had caused an increase in the poverty rate in the capital city. Data from Statistics Indonesia (BPS) show that in September 2020, 4.69 percent of Jakarta residents or about 480,860 people were classified as poor.

In fact, before the pandemic, the poverty rate in the capital city was on the downward trend. In September 2019, the poverty rate in Jakarta was recorded at 3.42 percent, a significant drop from 4.61 percent in 2007. The poverty rate in September 2020 seemed to return back the figure recorded 13 years ago.

Inevitably, many residents lost their jobs or their businesses or at least suffered a significant drop in their incomes.

The poverty rate has increased due to the implementation of social restrictions to halt the spread the spread of Covid-19. Many businesses were shut down or just partly operated due the people mobility restrictions. Inevitably, many residents lost their jobs or their businesses or at least suffered a significant drop in their incomes.

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Prior to the pandemic, in coping with the poverty and the increase in poor people, the Jakarta had implemented a number of social assistance programs such as the Jakarta Children Cards, Jakarta People with Disabilities Cards, Jakarta Elderly Cards, Jakarta Smart Cards, Jakarta Superior Students Cards, subsidies for health insurance for the poor as well as the food assistance program.

During the pandemic, the assistance for social protection to cope with the impact of the pandemic has increased significantly thanks to the cooperation of the Jakarta government and the central government in handling the problem such as in the distribution of the food assistance in 2020 and the disbursement of the direct cash assistance in 2021.

However, the government’s social assistance program still has a weakness. The most disturbing, as seen in the case of Tikno, is the inaccurate population data.

A survey on the distribution of the first phase of the direct cash assistance in 2020 conducted by the Indonesian People\'s Struggle Union (SPRI) found part of the aid did not reach the targeted recipients. Dika Moehammad, SPRI’s secretary general, said that some of the recipients of the assistance across 12 sub districts in Jakarta were categorized as well-off families. Another finding also showed that there were at least 600 poor families with Jakarta ID cards and 534 poor families with regional ID cards did not receive assistance.

Kompas/Totok Wijayanto

Crowded area in Muara Angke, Penjaringan, Jakarta, on Saturday (3/2). Based on Central Statistics Agency data, from the total 26.58 million poor people in Indonesia, about 10.27 million lived in urban areas.

Ahmad Riza said that the number of the recipients of the social assistance to mitigate the impact of pandemic distributed by the Jakarta administration had reached about 1,160,409 families, while the number of the recipients of the aid provided by the central government had reached 1,299,794 families.

In 2021, the Jakarta government is set to provide the direct cash assistance to 1,055,216 families through Bank DKI, while the central government planes to disburse the direct cash assistance to 733,747 families through state postal company PT Pos Indonesia. Even so, he acknowledged that the lack of accuracy on the data of the poor remained a problem. For this reason, the Jakarta Social Service Office is currently updating the poverty data so that the poor people who have not received social assistance are included in the integrated social welfare data system.

(This article was translated by Hendarsyah Tarmizi).