Most buildings fail to comply with smoking ban

A majority of buildings in the capital have failed to comply with a gubernatorial decree banning smoking inside buildings, a city agency says.

The Jakarta Environmental Management Agency (BPLHD) found that out of 249 buildings monitored for their implementation of the smoking ban, only 21 buildings, or eight percent, could be categorized as “very good” in complying with the regulation.

Most of the buildings failed to comply with orders to remove smoking sections and mandate that smokers light up outside.

BPLHD head Peni Susanti said her agency had also received 381 complaints on the agency’s website about 81 buildings in the city that have flouted the smoking ban.

“Fifty-seven of them have been given reprimands about the violation,” she said.

She said complaints were also made through the agency’s call center.

In the past four months, the BPLHD has monitored the implementation of gubernatorial decree No. 88/2010 that outlaws smoking inside buildings and workplaces in the city.

From the survey, the agency found 90 received a “good” grade, 52 buildings were “average” and 86 were “poor”.

Peni said that based on the survey, the city administration would do more to campaign for the smoking ban especially with building management.

University of Indonesia sociologist Imam Prasodjo said the failure to thoroughly impose the ban on smoking indicates that cigarette companies still had the upper hand.

“Cigarette companies are thriving. They use sponsorship as their tool and it seems that they have infiltrated every part of society, our people, men and women,” he said.

Mara Oloan Siregar, assistant to the city secretary, said that the smoking ban could only be effective if other stakeholders, including NGOs and other government agencies, came to its aid.

Mara alleged there had been a systematic campaign to overturn the ban.

She said a recent protest staged by dozens of street vendors who sold cigarettes for a living were in fact stage-managed by cigarette makers.

“I suspect they were actually paid by agents from cigarette companies,” he said.

The gubernatorial decree was issued in October of last year and was an amendment to a 2005 bylaw that allowed for smoking sections inside buildings.

source: www.thejakartapost.com