Floods paralyse Indonesian capital - FT.com A woman wades through a flooded street in downtown Jakarta Widespread flooding brought Jakarta to a standstill on Thursday, highlighting the poor infrastructure in the fast-growing Indonesian capital and its vulnerability to heavy seasonal rains and other natural disasters. The waters forced at least 10,000 people to flee their homes, and five people drowned or were killed by electrocution, according to the National Disaster Management Board (BNPB). Jakarta is one of the world's largest metropolitan areas with more than 20m inhabitants, but rapid urbanisation and poor planning have left the coastal city at high risk of flooding, particularly during monsoon rains in January and February. Heavy storms overnight inundated main roads in central Jakarta on Thursday morning, with many offices deserted as employees struggled to make it to work. The flooding was much worse in suburbs across the city, with some areas under as much as 2m of water. Lies Kartika Sari, a 37-year-old civil servant from the satellite city of Bekasi, was among the tens of thousands affected. On her way to work in Jakarta with her husband, their motorbike seized up twice because of the floods. They eventually turned back after they crashed into an obstacle that had been obscured by the water. "This is a kind of force majeure, but it could still be better anticipated and better managed," she said. The government should work harder to build a better drainage system, so if there is torrential rain, the effect won't be that bad. Jakarta is the beating heart of Indonesia's thriving economy, contributing about a fifth of national gross domestic product. Investors are concerned that the infrastructure cannot keep up with the city's growth. "I had some business meetings today with important clients but they had to be cancelled due to the floods," said Riswandi Sinuraya, a 37-year-old salesman in Jakarta. This is bad for business, very bad. Local officials warned that there was a risk of further flooding in the coming days because weather forecasts are for more heavy rain. Phillip Charlesworth, the head of the Indonesia office of the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies, warned that peak tides later this month could cause further problems, slowing the pace at which the city's 13 main waterways drain into the sea. Mr Charlesworth said that unless the local and national government did more to improve the city's limited drainage systems, these floods "will occur more frequently and put people at risk more often" as climate change makes weather patterns increasingly unpredictable. Underdog Joko Widodo was elected as Jakarta's new governor in September on a platform to build a proper public transport network and mitigate the seasonal floods that hit Jakarta every year. Already Mr Widodo, one of the few Indonesian politicians with a record of clean and efficient governance, has come under criticism for failing to move fast enough to reduce the flooding risk. Yet, Ms Sari argued, voters understand that the city cannot be transformed overnight. "I guess the governor is trying as best as he can to solve the floods, but it won't be easy for him because it's a chronic problem in Jakarta," she said.