Jakarta People and Culture, Government

Jakarta has its own special Betawi culture, which the influences reached the city’s shores over the centuries. Along process of selectively borrowing and uniquely blending Chinese, Arab, Portuguese and Dutch elements with native ingenuity has produces the colorful. The word “Betawi” is derived from Batavia, the old name of the capital during the Dutch administration. Java, Sumatra’s, Bali and Sulawesi, hailing from Papua and Kalimantan, home of the Dayaks and one of the largest rainforests in the world it is part of the city dominant populations. Over the centuries, these groups have kept their cultural roots, yet some have also intermixed, including with non-Indonesians, to form a special group of their own known as Orang Betawi.

Jakarta has status of province with very extensive size and population similar to the other 33 provinces throughout Indonesia. As a province, Jakarta is headed by Governor who is directly responsible to the President of Republic of Indonesia via the Minister of the Home Affair. Jakarta is considered a Special Region (Daerah Khusus Ibukota – DKI). Jakarta had five municipalities (Kotamadya): Jakarta Pusat (Central Jakarta), Jakarta Utara (North Jakarta), Jakarta Timur (East Jakarta), Jakarta Selatan (South Jakarta) and Jakarta Barat (West Jakarta). Each headed by a Mayor (Walikota). Each municipality is comprised with few of Kecamatan, headed by a Camat, and each Kecamatan is divided into Kelurahan or ‘village’ level.


Jakarta uniquely stands with collection of villages, with neighborhoods providing the basic services such as garbage collection and security. In Jakarta, there are 43 sub-districts and 265 villages. In addition, there are also social organizations as of neighborhoods units: Rukun Tetangga (RT) and Rukun Warga (RW), which are under jurisdiction of a sub-district. Thousand Island or Kepulauan Seribu is Jakarta administrative regency.