Tag: Jakarta

Exit polls show Indonesian President Joko Widodo winning second term – Radio France Internationale

JAKARTA  — Joko Widodo looks set for a second term and final term as president of Indonesia, with unofficial early tallies putting him around 10 per cent ahead of challenger Prabowo Subianto, a former general who also faced off against Widodo for the presidency in the last vote in 2014. Widodo, known by his nickname “Jokowi,” did not claim victory on the back of the so-called “quick count” numbers released by several polling organizations during the afternoon after voting closed at 1pm. Greeting jubilant supporters at a Jakarta theatre, Widodo asked them to keep cool, despite previous elections’ early tallies usually proving accurate. “We’ve seen indications from exit polls and quick count results, but we must patiently wait for official counts,” he said. However, in another reprise of the 2014 contest, Prabowo declared himself the winner, citing his own campaign’s exit polls that he said put him over the 50 per cent mark. “There have been attempts from pollsters and surveys that we know of, cooperating with one side, to steer public opinion as if we have lost,”he told media and supporters as the early tallies emerged. In 2014, with the margin tighter at 6 per cent, Prabowo unsuccessfully challenged the outcome in Indonesia’s highest court, with supporters taking to the streets to back his claims.  It is not clear if opposition supporters will protest again, with Prabowo cautioning against “anarchy” after voting closed. “My fellow countrymen, we must not be provoked,” he said.

Survivors leaving quake-stricken town in Indonesia as frustration grows over relief effort – Los Angeles Times/RTÉ

RTÉ

JAKARTA — Survivors were leaving the disaster-hit region of Central Sulawesi on Thursday out of frustration with what they said was the slow provision of assistance from the Indonesian government and aid agencies in the aftermath of a magnitude 7.5 earthquake and tsunami. Widely reported shortages of food, water, gasoline and other necessities have led to looting of damaged shops and supermarkets in Palu, the provincial capital of 380,000 residents near the quake’s epicenter. Though a few positive signs were emerging in the shattered city — with access to water restored for some residents — relief remained slow to arrive on damaged roads and ground that had churned into mud. Residents said there isn’t enough food and water for the thousands of injured and 70,000 left homeless. “The last I heard, my brother was picking up my mother and father in Palu to evacuate to another district,” said Imade Boby, a Jakarta resident whose parents and relatives live in Palu. He said the family hoped to travel by boat or by road to an area of Parigi Moutong, north of Palu, that was less affected by the disaster.

Southeast Asia’s traditional markets try to hold their own – Nikkei Asian Review

SINGAPORE — “Yes, hello, fruits?” Shouting above the din, vendor Sini Mohamad leans forward into a conga line of office workers edging between dozens of lavishly provisioned stalls in Singapore’s Tekka Market. It is lunchtime, and crowds throng the market as dozens of hawker stalls dish out noodles, rice and curries. Most ignore Mohamad’s appeals. But he keeps at it, alongside stallholders selling meat, fish, vegetables and spices. The lunchtime crowd offers a fleeting chance for butchers and grocers to persuade passers-by to do a bit of grocery shopping before they head back to work, their palettes whetted by the aromas of spices and herbs clinging to the steamy market air.

Diver exposes plastic rubbish off Bali coast – The Daily Telegraph

JAKARTA — Footage of a vast plastic ‘slick’ shot by a British diver off the coast of Bali has put renewed focus on the growing threat of ocean pollution. Rich Horner filmed himself swimming through swathes of plastic rubbish floating in turquoise waters around 15 miles offshore from Denpasar, the Balinese regional capital. The footage is being seen as a warning over increasingly toxic levels of plastic waste along some of the most picturesque shorelines of Indonesia, which is heavily reliant on tourism. “Plastic bags, plastic bottles, plastic cups, plastic sheets, plastic buckets, plastic sachets, plastic straws, plastic baskets, plastic bags, more plastic bags,” Horner wrote.

UK targets Indonesia in first test of “Global Britain” plan – The Daily Telegraph

JAKARTA/LONDON — British engineers could be handed lucrative contracts with Indonesia to regenerate its ailing road and rail networks under a government push to boost trade and diplomatic ties with Southeast Asia after Brexit. The move would pit British firms against Chinese and Japanese giants who are vying for influence over Indonesia’s growing economy, in one of the first tests of the UK’s post-Brexit “Global Britain” push. “We are trying to get a greater slice of the action,” Moazzam Malik, the British ambassador in Indonesia, told the Telegraph as UK officials unveiled plans to increase business ties.

Indonesian judges reject demand to ban sex outside marriage – The Daily Telegraph

SINGAPORE – Indonesia’s constitutional court today turned down a petition to have extra-marital sex banned, the latest culture war skirmish in the world’s biggest Muslim democracy. A narrow 5-4 majority of judges voted to reject the request made by a group called the Family Love Alliance which said it wants Indonesian law to categorise adultery to mean any relationship that involves sex outside marriage, not just married people having affairs. The group said it would appeal the decision and is hoping that like-minded MPs will resume the campaign in parliament to criminalise “sexual deviance,” including gay relationships as well as adultery.

Thousands of Indonesians protest at Jakarta embassy over Burma’s treatment of Rohingya Muslims – The Daily Telegraph

JAKARTA — Thousands of Indonesian Muslims chanting “Allahu Akbar” protested in central Jakarta on Wednesday at Burma’s treatment of its 1.1 million Rohingya minority. Around 146,000 Rohingya have fled Burma military counter-insurgency operations into Bangladesh over the past two weeks. The army’s reprisals came after Rohingya militants stormed Burma army and police posts in August. Wednesday’s protest was the fourth and biggest pro-Rohingya demonstration over the past week in the Indonesian capital, the commercial centre of the world’s biggest Muslim-majority country. The event was peaceful, though toward the end several dozen demonstrators tried to push through police barricades and razor-wire set up about 200 yards from the Burmese embassy. Overhead swung an effigy of the Buddhist monk Wirathu, leader of an anti-Islamic movement in Burma that has been blamed for stirring anti-Rohingya feeling in the predominantly Buddhist country.

Asia’s main archipelagos eye bigger share of maritime trade – Nikkei Asian Review

JAKARTA — The world’s seaborne trade exceeded 10 billion tons in a single year for the first time in 2015, according to the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development, with about 60% passing through Asia. Sitting between the Indian and Pacific Oceans, Southeast Asia’s big archipelagos should be well placed to capitalize as trade expands. Indonesia and the Philippines comprise about 17,000 and 7,500 islands respectively, while Indonesia, home to the world’s fourth-biggest population — about 260 million people — has the second-longest coastline after Canada. However, the bulk of this seaborne trade is moving between Europe and Asia’s powerhouse economies in China and Japan, mainly through the South China Sea and the Strait of Malacca, which lies between Malaysia and the Indonesian island of Sumatra. “The largest archipelagic countries in the world are not being optimized,” said Fauziah Zen, an economist with the Economic Research Institute for ASEAN and East Asia, at the recent launch of a report on Southeast Asia’s maritime infrastructure published by The Habibie Center, a Jakarta-based research organization.

BlackBerry hopes to power internet of things – Nikkei Asian Review

JAKARTA — For a decade or so before the market for touchscreen smartphones took off around 2010, BlackBerry’s hand-held communication devices were ubiquitous among thumb-jockeying executives trying to keep in touch with the office outside working hours. After several recent failed attempts to launch new phones and operating systems to compete against Apple, Google and Samsung Electronics products, the company that “made the modern cellphone,” as BlackBerry’s CEO John Chen puts it, is hoping to become the main supplier of secure applications and software for the next generation of internet-linked devices — the much- touted “internet of things” — from web-connected self-driving cars to “smart” domestic appliances that are expected to take off over the coming decade. “It’s going to be very much driven by securing end-point communications,” Chen told the Nikkei Asian Review. “We want to be the number one secure communications in IoT. We have signed a deal with Ford for seven years to help them build their next generation cars.”