Jakarta – The demonstrations in Jakarta are still ongoing as of Thursday evening August 28 with protesters and police again involved in clashes in the Penjaringan area of Central Jakarta.
The protesters allegedly fired fireworks and threw stones and Molotov cocktails at the police who responded by firing teargas. Shops near the location of the clash were closed. Police in full uniform were seen trying to make a barricade and on guard to secure a gas station on Jalan Pejompongan.
According to reports from CNN Indonesia journalists at the location, the demonstrators threw firecrackers at the gas station several times. A one point a fire was blazing at the gasoline pump. Local security officers were getting ready to extinguishing the fire. The protesters still held their ground even though they had been beaten back by police.
As has been reported, group of students and social organisations held a demonstration at the House of Representatives (DPR) building in Jakarta to voice protests related to allowances for DPR members.
Earlier, hundreds of students from a number of campuses in Jakarta filled two points, namely in front of the DPR's main entrance gate and at the rear gate or Pancasila parliament complex.
They descended on the DPR building after an earlier protest action by workers had disbanded. The protesters continued to arrive towards late afternoon after the labour rally disbanded at around 2 pm.
Upon arriving at the DPR building, the demonstrators were disappointed because coinciding with their arrival the gates to the DPR were closed.
"Today we came to the DPR building bringing the aspirations of the public, but see friends, the gates are closed tight", said one of the demonstrators.
Protesters from various elements of society have continued to hold demonstrations in front of the parliament building over the last few days. Two days earlier, a demonstration by students ended in chaos.
The authorities arrested more than 50 people. As a result of the chaos, a number of roads near the DPR were paralysed and public transportation closed down.
In order to anticipate a similar occurrence today, the police have rerouted traffic on a number of roads. A total of 4,531 joint personnel were mobilised to secure workers' actions today.
The thousands of personnel consist of 2,174 Metro Jaya Regional Police officers and 1,725 Under Operational Control (BKO) personnel involving elements of the Army (TNI AU), the Marines, the Mobile Police (Brimob) Headquarters, C Detachment, the Jakarta District Military Command (Kodim), the Tactical Police Unit Task Force (Kogas Sabhara), Public Order Agency (Satpol PP) officials, Public Transport Office (Dishub) officers and 632 personnel form District Police. (tim/isn)
[Translated by James Balowski. The original title of the article was "Demo Memanas di Penjernihan Jakarta Pusat, Ada Bom Molotov dan Petasan".]