"We have received a lot of complaints from our members who are generally micro, small and medium businessmen about the activities of the thugs," the Secretary General of the Executive Board of the Association of Indonesian Young Businessmen (HIPMI), Harry Warganegara Harun, said in Jakarta on Monday.
He emphasized that the police must not only take immediate action against them, but should also eradicate them.
Harun noted that micro, small and medium businesses have indeed been under thug-alert conditions, but they have so far kept silent or sought backing from security agencies with an additional cost to protect their businesses.
He said small businessmen had been squeezed at all levels. The businessmen have to pay soon after "goods leave factories or production centers and are on the way to marketplaces."
He further explained, "When the goods enter the marketplaces, businessmen have to pay again and traders also have to pay to thugs when the goods reach them.
Every day at least two to three thugs claiming to have come from certain big organizations asked for money from small and medium businessmen in the market, he added.
"Imagine. Micro businessmen have to pay Rp10,000 out of Rp100,000 profit to the thugs in addition to official retributions," he said.
Harun said almost every marketplace in Indonesia was troubled by illegal levies imposed by thugs, including shop houses.
"Only a modern marketplace like the one in Serpong is free of them. So, modernizing the marketplaces is important in order to prevent thuggery," he said.
Harun also blamed the police for the rise in such criminal activities. He pointed out that unfortunately, many "naughty" police officers, too, had taken part in the thuggery by asking the businessmen for security service money.
He expressed hope that the senior officers would take action against the guilty.
"HIPMI hopes the police leaders would act against their men who act as backers in market areas or neighborhoods, and of certain individuals. Assuring security is the task of the police and the people have paid taxes for it," he said, adding that thuggery is one of the factors that have so far hindered the development of small businesses in Indonesia.
(Uu.H-YH/INE)
Editor: Priyambodo RH
Copyright © ANTARA 2012
