A Jakarta official says the provincial government is struggling to enforce the work from home policy (WFH) in the city despite a worrying uptrend in the number of COVID-19 clusters from offices.
Recently, the Jakarta Manpower, Transmigration, and Energy Agency (Disnakertrans) released fresh data showing that 2,107 offices had been ordered to temporarily shut in accordance to COVID-19 protocols since the turn of the year.
Of those, the city recorded 157 positive cases from 78 offices between April 5-11, and 425 cases from 177 offices between April 12-18.
Disnakertrans head Andri Yansyah said enforcement of WFH has been difficult as the agency, which currently only has 59 field supervisors, is severely undermanned.
"Maybe one reason is vaccinations, which made some believe that they are invulnerable when they're actually not. Second, maybe they're bored as [the pandemic] has been going on for a long time. And workers who go to the office rarely wash their hands anymore even though we provide the facilities," Andri said.
The Jakarta Chamber of Commerce believes a driving factor to WFH going out of fashion in the capital is employers' reluctance to adopt the policy, especially among businesses that believe working away from the office reduces productive output.
Under Jakarta's Micro Enforcement of Restrictions on Public Activities (Micro PPKM), which is in effect until at least May 3, workplaces in the capital are allowed to open to 50 percent capacity.