Bulog distributes cheap rice to poor in West, Central Java

Nana Rukmana and Agus Maryono, The Jakarta Post, Indramayu/Banyumas

The State Logistics Agency (Bulog) distributed low-cost Vietnamese rice to more than 550,000 poor families in Indramayu, West Java, and Banyumas in Central Java, on Tuesday to allay the burden of skyrocketing prices of rice in the two provinces.

Thousands of local people selected from poor families formed long lines outside outlets set up by Bulog's offices in the two provinces.

Each family is permitted to purchase a maximum of 20 kilograms under the plan.

The imported rice is sold at Rp 1,000 per kilogram.

The crisis in the two regencies over the last two weeks took place when the price of local rice rose sharply to around Rp 3,000 from between Rp 1,500 and Rp 2,000 in normal times, due to the widespread hoarding of rice and other basic commodities.

Many traders have suspended sales and left their stocks in their storage places due to the government's plan to increase fuel prices sometime this month. Other traders have also hoarded their fuel stocks, causing a kerosene crisis.

The state-owned oil company Pertamina, in cooperation with local police and attorney general's office, have confiscated thousands of tons of hoarded kerosene in its operation in the provinces' local market.

Itsutri Parwanto, deputy chief of Bulog's local office in Banyumas, said he has registered a total of 333,500 poor people in Banyumas, Banjarnegara, Cilacap and Purbalingga as eligible to purchase the imported rice.

The policy, he said, was devised in part to solve the rice crisis by forcing speculators to sell their hoarded stocks.

"Local people should not resort to unrest because of the rice crisis," he said. "Bulog can handle it."

Banyumas Regent Aris Setiono said the local administration would closely monitor the distribution of the discounted rice and would take actions against any trader or profiteer discovered taking advantages of the mass distribution.

"It is very unethical and immoral to take financial advantage of poor people's suffering," he said.

In Cirebon, hundreds of local people staged a demonstration, demanding Pertamina president Baihaki Hakim and National Police Chief Gen. Da'i Bachtiar step down because of their institutions' failure to handle the kerosene crisis.

The demonstrators, partly activists of local non-governmental organizations (NGOs), staged their actions at the regency legislative council, Cirebon City Police Headquarters and the local Pertamina office.

The demonstrators also complained that the government's plan to raise fuel prices has triggered significant jumps in the prices of other basic commodities in the regency, and called on President Megawati Soekarnoputri to replace Minister of Energy and Mineral Resources Purnomo Yusgiantoro.

"Baihaki, Purnomo and Da'i are three men who must be held responsible for the kerosene and rice crisis in the regency and the other parts of the country," said an activist who coordinated the demonstration.