JAKARTA: A mezzanine floor overlooking the main lobby of the Indonesian Stock Exchange building collapsed on Monday, injuring scores of people, many of them students, under slabs of concrete and other debris.
The high-rise building, constructed in the late 1990s, is part of a two-tower complex in the heart of the financial district and houses dozens of other offices including the World Bank. It was the target of a car bombing by Islamist militants in September 2000.
Police ruled out a bomb as a cause of Monday’s collapse. They said more than 70 people had been injured, but no deaths had been reported.
Jakarta governor Anies Baswedan visited the site and said the city will “audit the building,” which was last inspected by authorities in May.
“I have conveyed to the building’s management that the audit of the construction should start tonight so that the activities of the stock exchange are not disturbed,” Baswedan told reporters.
Safety standards are often loosely enforced in Indonesia. Last year, a fire that ripped through a fireworks factory on the outskirts of Jakarta killed around 50 people in one of the country’s worst industrial accidents. A police investigation found multiple safety violations.
Many of the injured were university students who were on the mezzanine floor when it collapsed.
“There was a rumbling noise but it wasn’t an explosion. It was like something had fallen, and suddenly the floor we were standing on fell away,” said student Alfita, 20, who uses one name. She escaped with light bruises.
Dramatic CCTV footage aired on television showed a floor shearing away in a matter of seconds under the students. Reuters could not immediately authenticate the video.
“Slabs of concrete started to fall, there was lots of dust. Water pipes had burst,” said Megha Kapoor, who works in the building and was in the lobby at the time.
Police cordoned off the complex as people fled the building and the more seriously injured were taken away by stretcher.
Triana Tambunan, business development manager at MRCC Siloam hospital, one of the hospitals near the building, said 30 people had been admitted so far. Victims were being treated at four hospitals.
“The bone fractures may be serious. We need to carry out further evaluations,” she said, adding there were at least three suspected fractures.
Stock exchange president director Tito Sulistio said the exchange would pay for the treatment of the visiting students.
Finance Minister Sri Mulyani Indrawati said she hoped the collapse would not affect investor confidence in the tropical Southeast Asian archipelago. The exchange resumed business in the afternoon as per schedule.
Scores injured as Indonesia stock exchange building lobby floor collapses
Scores injured as Indonesia stock exchange building lobby floor collapses
Philippines seeks to regain Chinese visitors as arrivals lag behind regional rivals
- 262,000 Chinese tourists visited Philippines in 2025, compared to 1.7m in 2019
- Vietnam is top destination for Chinese travelers, with about 4.8m visitors this year
MANILLA: The Philippines is trailing behind other countries in Southeast Asia in winning back Chinese tourists, with arrivals well below a quarter of pre-pandemic levels so far this year, latest data showed.
Known for its white sandy beaches, famous diving spots and diverse culture, the Philippines was welcoming an increasing number of Chinese tourists in the period before the pandemic, with the number peaking at over 1.7 million in 2019, when it was the second-largest source market after South Korea.
But the post-pandemic rebound has been slow, with China ranking sixth among international arrivals and the number of Chinese visitors reaching only 262,000 as of Dec. 20, according to data from the Philippine Department of Tourism.
“China remains one of the country’s largest and most important source markets,” the tourism department said earlier this week.
Chinese arrivals this year are equivalent to only around 15 percent of the numbers in 2019 and there is stiff competition with regional rivals like Vietnam, Thailand, Malaysia, Singapore and Indonesia each welcoming at least 1 million tourists from China in 2025.
Vietnam has become Chinese travelers’ top travel destination in Southeast Asia with around 4.8 million visitors so far this year, followed by Thailand, which has recorded about 4.36 million.
China is Singapore’s top source market, with nearly 3 million visitors as of November.
To attract more visitors from China, the Philippines reintroduced electronic visas for Chinese travelers in November, after suspending the system for two years.
“The eVisa resumption is a critical step forward and a clear signal that the Philippines is open, ready, and eager to welcome our Chinese friends,” said Ireneo Reyes, the tourism attache to China.
“While the timing meant that its full benefits could not be felt within the peak booking periods of 2025, we expect a more visible impact beginning the first quarter of 2026.”
The Philippine tourism department said that “recovery has also been constrained by reduced flight capacity, with China-Philippines routes operating at only about 45 percent of pre-pandemic levels,” adding that officials were working closely with relevant stakeholders to “rebuild connectivity and confidence.”
Tourism is an important sector in the Philippine economy, according to a report by the ASEAN+3 Macroeconomic Research Office, accounting for about 13.2 percent of the country’s gross domestic product last year and making up around 13.8 percent of its labor force.
