Jakarta – A smoking ban has been in place since 2005 in the capital city, but cigarette smokers still puff in 70 percent of public places where smoking is prohibited, the results of recent research showed.
The research, carried out between 2014 and 2015 at 1,550 places in Jakarta by the Jakarta Smoke Free Coalition, said 1,085 places ignored the smoking ban.
Jakarta Smoke Free Coalition coordinator Dollaries Riauaty Suhadi said on Tuesday that the researchers found people smoking in schools, offices, restaurants, houses of worship, healthcare centers, hotels, shopping malls and other indoor facilities where smoking is prohibited under the city bylaw on air pollution control.
During the data collection, the researchers found various indications that certain places still allowed people to smoke, including cigarette ash, ashtrays and cigarette smoke odor.
"All those indicators showed that there were still violations against the smoking ban regulations because in those places, smoking is prohibited," said Dollaries as reported by kompas.com.
The smoking ban is stipulated in City Bylaw No. 2/2005 on air pollution control, which is elaborated in Gubernatorial Regulation No. 75/2005 on smoking ban areas and Gubernatorial Regulation No. 50/2012 on the supervision, monitoring and law enforcement of smoking ban areas.
Under the bylaw, violators face six months in jail or a Rp 50 million fine. (bbn)