Aircraft workers protest over KKN
Aircraft workers protest over KKN
The Jakarta Post, Jakarta
Some 5,000 workers of state-owned aircraft company PT
Dirgantara Indonesia thronged Jakarta on buses from their plant
on Bandung to air their grievances directly at President Megawati
Soekarnoputri.
But the workers, who tried to march to the Merdeka Palace,
were met with layers of police lines. They failed to meet with
the President who already had a busy schedule.
The workers were protesting at management's failure to
eradicate KKN -- the popular Indonesian acronyms for corruption,
collusion and nepotism -- in their company and to demand higher
salaries.
In a written statement, the workers said they came to Jakarta
to show their support for President Megawati "so that she will
have no hesitation in cleaning up all state companies from the
grip of corruption, collusion and nepotism."
Besides complaining at the poor management, the workers said
corruption practices remained rampant at the company, previously
better known by IPTN, short for the Indonesian words of Nusantara
Aircraft Industry.
The workers later marched towards the House of Representatives
building to take their complaints there.
The company has been beset by a series of crippling strikes in
the last three years as the government, at the behest of the
International Monetery Fund, stopped further funding to a company
regarded as either a show piece or a white elephant.
Separately, Air Force chief of staff Marshall Hanafie Asnan,
who is commissioner of the company, appealed to workers to end
their strike and to "work things out" together.
"We will resolve the matter properly. But the most important
thing is for them to work again because aircraft manufacturing is
a strategic industry and the Air Force badly needs it," he said.
"As Air Force chief of staff, I have the greatest interest in
seeing them back at work," Hanafie said on the sidelines of a
rehearsal for the Indonesian Military's (TNI's) 56th anniversary
celebration at the Halim Perdanakusumah air base.