TEMPO.CO, Jakarta - Coordinating Minister for Human Development and Culture Minister Muhadjir Effendy assessed that the 2021 Eid homecoming or mudik ban policy was quite effective as it has been running quite well. “The policy is not 100 percent successful but that does not mean it fails. In general, it runs good,” he said in a release received by Tempo in Jakarta, Sunday, May 16.

The assessment was based on the use of historical data on the policy implementation, tightening supervision in a number of alternative routes studied, and the modus operandi applied by homecomers who insisted on going mudik with creative ways yet successfully anticipated by authorities.

Based on the police data, only one million Indonesians traveled to their hometown to celebrate Eid al-Fitr, and that significantly dropped compared to last year’s number, Muhadjir informed. The return traffic was predicted to peak on the weekend post Eid on May 15-16, 2021.

The government had prepared measures to anticipate the arrival of those travelers in the capital city of Jakarta and several cities including provincial capitals.

According to Muhadjir, the government had also prepared additional facilities such as hospital beds, ICU rooms, and oxygen tanks, and deployed more tracers from 5,000 to 100,000 people.

“Hopefully this will be more effective in preventing the spread of new COVID-19 variants that already exist in Singapore, Malaysia, the Philippines,” said Muhadjir.

Read: Police to Continue Turning Back Mudik Vehicles until May 24

ANTARA