Activists slam severance pay for councillors in North Aceh

Activists and the public condemned a plan to earmark Rp 4.5 billion (US$529,412) severance pay for the 45 councillors of the North Aceh Council, saying that it was a setback for the regency.

Council speaker Saifuddin Ilyas said on Saturday that the plan was indeed being discussed by the council's budget committee.

Separately, North Aceh regent Tarmizi A. Karim said in North Aceh capital Lhokseumawe that he had been informed of the plan, but he declined to confirm or to deny his endorsement of it. Here merely confirmed that "the plan is being discussed".

Yusuf Ismail Pase, chairman of the local office of the Indonesian Advocates Association, said the plan was improper.

"The councillors do not have a sense of crisis," he said, and that the plan was inappropriate in consideration of the current situation in the province, which is plagued by an economic crisis and prolonged armed conflict between the Free Aceh Movement (GAM) and the Indonesian Military (TNI).

Nanggroe Aceh Darussalam province, with a population of some 450,000, has been under martial law since May 19, 2003, when the government launched its so-called integrated operation to quell the GAM separatist movement.

Yusuf added that the councillors had received more than adequate payment from the state during their terms. The councillors' terms are up this year, having served the designated five years since 1999.

"They have been given tens of millions in monthly salaries and they have received other facilities, such as ownership credit to buy a car. It is more than enough to live on and save," he said.

Association of Islamic Students (HMI) North Aceh chairman Munazar also rejected the plan, saying that the money earmarked for severance pay should be allocated to the poor. -- Antara