The Path to Sweetness & Light on The Road...
Driving from Sanur to Kerobokan the other day, with a friend
following in the car behind, I came across a sight that must
make the heart of every foreigner driving in Bali sink through
the floor. The Shakedown! In this case, a Mass Shakedown!
Just over the lights at the cross roads, that compass of asphalt,
on Sunset Highway, just as you enter the stretch heading West
toward Jalan Kunti, it seemed about 100 of Bali’s finest,
plus half the cop cars in the Island, were arrayed along the
side of the road hauling in every single vehicle that passed.
It was almost a festive sight, in fact it rather had the look
of a country fair. Vehicles parked all over the place, lights
flashing and groups in animated discussion, haggling, arguing
and gesticulating.
As I glided to a halt, seat belt on and papers in order, I
composed my face into that habitual attempt at friendly helpfulness
I adopt on such occasions, long ago having found that my more
genuine expression of frozen contempt didn’t get me
very far. I mean, if you’re going to be shaken down
by a public servant you want to enjoy the experience, don’t
you? After all, the guy needs to feel good about himself,
doesn’t he? A crisp middle aged policeman came up saluted,
wished me good day and politely asked to see my driving license.
With a brief look, a cursory glance into the car and a pleasant
smile, he waved me on my way. “Wow!” I shared
with my companions, “things have really changed around
here”.
The Going Rate?
That was not how my friend in the car following ours felt
when he eventually caught up with us as we waited for him
a mile down the road. His experience was a lot more traditional.
We could see as we drove off he was in for some “discussion”.
In brief, he hadn’t got his seat belt on and though
he had an International License at home, he only had his own
national driving license on him. The informal on-the-spot
fine was Rp. 150,000 (bad news I’m afraid if that’s
the going rate). In fairness to my friend, while obviously
fuming he was also struggling with the inescapable fact that
he was in the wrong. Best leave people alone at such times
to get over it I always feel. Call it empathy. cheery
remarks like “Get a receipt, did’ja?” and
other helpful suggestions do not calm matters down any quicker
I find.
I’m sure most of us have had our fair share of egregious
shake downs by traffic cops in Bali over the years There are
many forms of it. An old favourite is the car registration
that does not entitle you to be driven in your hire car by
a Balinese because, unless you have CS registration plates
for that would be tourism. Of course you were expected to
intuit this and you had to pay, not the bloke who rented you
the car, unless of course you wanted to argue the toss downtown
Denpasar. In which case, Good Luck! Another great one was
the “no man’s land” between two traffic
lights at a busy intersection (Imam Bonjol and the incomplete
Sunset or White Road cross-over was classic). Here, in busy
traffic, there was no way in the world that all the cars proceeding
on green could pass the second traffic light before it turned
red. If you didn’t proceed on green at the first light,
because you knew the score, you would be busted for holding
up the traffic. If you were caught in the middle on red you
would be busted for running a light, or how else could you
be there? At least three cars were caught at every change
of the light in even moderate traffic. What a honeypot! The
place attracted traffic cops likes flies to a cowpat. A river
of gold, no less. There must have been some constabular “subak”
system to ensure a fair do’s for all.
Different Roads, Same Destination…..
The question to my mind is, are we better or worse off with
the system here, as opposed to what we are used to in Europe,
Australia or the US?
(Though, perhaps Italy might be an excepted from the above).
Being shaken down unfairly, and pretending to like it, because
you don’t want to spend a day in Denpasar, or spend
a month and a bundle of boodle trying to recoup your documents,
does tend to stick in the craw of even the mildest of us.
On the other hand, paying an informal “on-the-spot fine”
of between US$5.00 to $15.00 when you are clearly in the wrong,
even though you suspect it may not actually find its way into
the bank account of whatever passes for Bali’s
Department of Roads & Transportation, may in fact
be preferable to how it works back from wherever you’re
from. So don’t be too quick to knock it.
In most European capitals driving a car is a blood sport and
you are the quarry. Parking is a nightmare and clamping a
clear and present danger. If you transgress, and nowadays
we are all observed electronically every step of the way,
you will be fined or prosecuted. On-the-spot fines are more
like US$60.00 for starters than $10.00, and only someone of
a pathologically disputatious nature with the money and the
time to burn is likely to go to court to argue the toss, innocent
or not. Things are getting even worse now that the authorities
have acquired the habit of franchising off much of the penalties
for minor road infractions to the private sector.
Are things truly so very different in essence? It begins to
seem more like convergence to me…..
It’s a Mechanized Force…..
In the old days, not so long ago, before the Bali police got
all these new cars they now seem to have in such abundance,
the advise foreigners would give themselves was first off,
to have shaded windows so the cops couldn’t see you
were a foreigner and thus a prime prospect; and second, never
catch their eye or look at them, so you could drive on without
seeing them waving you down. That way, the theory was, you
usually got away with it, unless it was a “honey-pot”
spot and they had a motorbike to send after you.
In my humble opinion, Bali has an opportunity here to be a
shining light unto the world. Truly rotten cops can and do
infect police forces everywhere, but thankfully the police
are usually ordinary, decent men and women trying to do a
difficult job. So let’s leave out the unfair stitch-up,
pure and simple. My guess is that they are not that common
anyway.
In a Perfect World……
So, given that there is some infringement to warrant the occasion,
my suggestion is a workable hybrid of the formal and the informal
that instantly abolishes corruption in this vexéd sector.
On-the-spot fines should be authorised, And, Yes! Traffic
policemen should be required to issue receipts. However, since
they fill in the form, they put down a lesser amount than
they actually take in from the offending driver. In
this way, the policeman issuing a Rp 100,000 ticket to a driver
records a Rp. 50,000 offence and pockets Rp. 50,000 as “commission”.
Bali’s exchequer, hopefully, will receive the other
Rp. 50,000 or portion thereof to improve the roads (well,
that may be expecting too much....). So just as in America,
the UK and Australia, where franchised commission agents legally
persecute honest motorists, you have in Bali honest traffic
cops working on commission and doing their job, while the
entire community benefits, to some extent at least, from the
proceeds. Yey!
Thus, when half of Bali’s police force are out in force
on their monthly fund drive, manning a road block stopping
all Westbound traffic on the Sunset Highway for a day, and
Eastbound the next, every one of us can be happy. Non-defaulting
motorists can proceed on their virtuous way unharrassed. The
erring motorist can cheerfully pay a reasonable sum for his
or her fault, for which he receives a receipt preventing him
having to pay again for the same infraction twice in the same
day. The individual policeman augments his meagre salary in
a relatively honourable way, and the balance of monies raised
will go to his colleagues and superiors, while some of it
(more of it than now I suspect) may find its way into the
coffers of the Bali government for the benefit of the community
as a whole. Brilliant!
Now can anyone spot the flaw(s)? If you can, don’t bother
to write in.
