Drive-by attack on Go-Jek office as discontent simmers inside and out (UPDATE: CEO responds)

Go-Jek’s motorcycle ride service, photo taken from Go-jek.com

On Sunday, at around 10:35 local time, two men on a motorcycle drove up in front of one of Go-Jek’s offices in South Jakarta and fired a shot at the building, CNN Indonesia reports. A window was shattered, but luckily no one was hurt.

In case you don’t live in Indonesia, Go-Jek is an on-demand “Uber for motorcycles” app that lets users book rides and other services like food delivery and parcel transport at the click of a button.

(Update 11/2/15: More recent reports (link in Indonesian) say that, based on CCTV footage obtained by the police, the object that shattered the office’s glass was most likely not fired from a gun, but may have been hurled by hand. The title of this story and some parts have been edited to reflect this development.)

What we know about the incident

The two suspects were able to escape, although a witness gave police a detailed description of the motorbike and clothing the perpetrators were wearing.

Photo of the scene of the shooting, taken from Beritasatu.com

Go-Jek was not available for comment, though the firm did publish a note on its Facebook page about the incident.

We would like to assure you that the incident is being handled by the responsible authorities and that all of Go-Jek’s facilities are equipped with CCTV cameras […] No one was hurt in the incident […] We have not found bullets at the location, only a part of a screw driver which is thought to have been used by the suspect.

Before the CCTV footage became available, the items collected at the scene led police to assume that the weapon used was homemade, and that the tip of the screwdriver was used as the projectile. The suspects fired only a single shot, police concluded. CCTV footage obtained by the police later seems to suggest the projectile was not fired at all, but hurled at the window by hand.

When disruption leads to violence

Go-Jek and similar motorcycle services have become popular in Indonesia’s capital, leading them to recruit thousands of new drivers throughout the year. However, some groups of informal motorcycle taxi drivers (called ojek) have not reacted well to the emergence of app-based services. Ojeks have traditionally been the ones to perform these kinds of jobs, without being part of a regulated system. Many of these informal service providers see companies like Go-Jek as a threat to their income and livelihoods.

See: Why motorcycle taxi drivers are ganging up against on-demand ride apps in Indonesia
Past clashes now lead many to speculate that the simmering conflict between informal ojek drivers and Go-Jek might be the cause for this act of vandalism, but so far, facts don’t reveal a clear motive.

Go-Jek drivers are striking