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I did not know anything about Ridwal
Kamil until my Facebook wall was flooded with news about his breakthrough
policies on how to build the city of Bandung for everyone. He is not only a
great initiator, but also an energetic and aggressive leader because he speeds up
projects implementation schedules. He does not linger in deciding projects that
are related public welfare. If I am not mistaken, he decided multiple projects
within one year which rarely happened before. Projects were all meant to benefit the public, such as improving public parks, public transport systems, solving social
problems like beggar and busker. In addition, he is so distinct and deserves to
be touted as an excellent mayor because Bandung has been 100 years and so old,
and during this time period, the development has been sluggish like a turtle
walks. There have been multiple tenures in the mayor seat, even some of them had
led the city for two periods. However, there was no significant progress had been done until his leadership.
Bandung is known for its nice
weather dubbed as Kota Kembang. North of Bandung is a high lying and greeny
part that city goers can enjoy, most of the time, day-round cool weather as
well as a look-down view; one would think of central part of Bandung towards
Ciampelas and on to Lembang are the best places to move away from the hustle bustle
place like Jakarta. Furthermore, its
people are so welcoming. Sunda Language, with its smooth accent would always be
the main thing that holds outsiders to stay or gravitates them to come back if
they ever leave. Not to mention when it is spoken by a Neng Geulis. It would always
be embedded in your mind.
The period when I was in Bandung,
things were still the same like I said before. However, the development was
about to press the nature to shift towards the environmental collapse state as
there were lots of multiple story buildings were erected and other developments
happened without considering the public cost. Consequently, public spaces were squeezed.
In addition, sidewalks were taken by street sellers, beggars, and buskers.
People become unaware of public interest by making the city looked filthy. People
threw trash nearly everywhere: in the street, and most notorious one was to the
river. I recall at one time, Bandung was placed as the filthiest city. The city
government was not able to clean up the neighborhood because of overproduction
of waste plus lack of landfill. Another relatively horrible urban environment
state was the city was clogged by the traffic flowing from in and out of
Bandung. It made the air also so impure for people to inhale.
These all aforementioned conditions
have progressively improved as I came witness myself. I came to know that
Ridwan Kamil is the one who is really committed to change the city. I was also so
surprised that the development is happening fast, but the environment also does
look better. Public parks that were used to be the home for commercial activities
have now been brought back to its original purpose. Parks are for recreation.
Even I saw parks are thematic. There was a park for aging people, for the young
people who want to date. Maintenance system is well established. All parks are
well protected with fence and security; I feel like they just look better than
what I knew before. In addition, I have seen most of the main streets are relatively
cleaner. Dago, for example, it was so cool to walk by there. Interestingly,
every Ankot or Mikrolet has a small garbage can inside of it. It is to prevent
people to mess the car and the street. That is simple, but a significant
progress has been made. There are other incredible projects that are now going
on. I could not mention all of them here, but I am sure that Bandung is going
to be one of the best places to live in by Indonesians in the coming years.
Some of my Bandung indigenous friends
have a dissent opinion on what I praise here. They told me that indeed there
have been some changes in Bandung since Ridwan Kamil’s leadership. However,
there are still enormous problems out there that even have not been identified
yet. Some are pessimistic about the touted imminent better life because it
takes time to change the culture, they argue, to commensurate with the high
expectation that Ridwan Kamil and other pessimists do have in mind. But, my
response was at least Bandung has such a great leadership. He is going make a significant
change because he has a power. If you remember, all cities have money, lead by
highly respected dignitary mayors; they also hold masters, doctors degrees at
the end of their names, but they are just mainstream leaders. They are not
unique, and they are not change makers. For me, Ridwan Kamil is not a mainstream
leader, and he is a change maker. Let’s see what comes next!
**Hope this gives you an
inspiration
