JAKARTA: Establishments in Jakarta have been urged to evaluate their security systems to be better prepared to deal with any possible future terrorist attack.
Jakarta police chief Tito Karnavian met security personnel at major buildings shortly after the terror assault on Jakarta on Jan 14, and he noted that one of the security weaknesses in the Indonesian capital is the lack of closed circuit television cameras or CCTV.
"One of the weaknesses in Jakarta is the lack of digital security, in terms of CCTV," said Inspector-General Tito. "We don't have an expansive CCTV (system). I encouraged the governor of Jakarta Pak Ahok to produce a CCTV system and he agreed this year to provide some 6,000 or 7,000 points of CCTVs."
Besides using technology to beef up security, men on the ground are also important.
In Jakarta, there are hundreds of thousands of security guards or "satpams", outnumbering the 32,000 police officers in the capital. The satpams provide an essential security layer and they have been urged to work more closely with the police.
Security checks, common in almost all office buildings, shopping malls and major hotels, are handled by the satpams, with many of them doing their duties in a friendly, unintimidating manner.
Security personnel at major buildings say another area that can be improved is their intelligence-gathering ability, as satpams have no power to make arrests.
"We cannot underestimate a security incident in whatever form; we have to be alert," said Wardjono, head of security of the Indonesian Shopping Centre Management Association. "Any intelligence received from the malls is passed as soon as possible to the police as our powers are limited."
In the wake of the Jakarta attack, establishments have also been urged to provide more relevant training to their security officers.
"I want them also to understand about the specific characteristics of the terrorists' operations, terrorist groups," said Inspector-General Tito. "I want them also to work together more closely with other security systems, security managers, and build a network amongst them."
Inspector-General Tito said terrorists would evaluate the security systems of their targets before launching any attack, and the ones with weak systems would be the ones most vulnerable to a strike.
