Cannibalism 'common practice' for Manggarai train workshop

Bambang Nurbianto, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

Most people hearing the word cannibalism will certainly think of horrifying scenes: A man eats another man or an animal eats another animal. But it is not for people working with the Manggarai Coach Train workshop in Central Jakarta.

Cannibalism there is a common practice and necessary for them. As the supply of spare parts is very limited, workers there have to take components from a decommissioned train and use them to repair other trains, a practice called cannibalism.

Such a practice keeps the state-owned railway company of PT Kereta Api Indonesia (KAI) to be able to carry out its duty in serving the public in Greater Jakarta and other cities in Java.

Head of the Manggarai Coach Train Workshop, Tating Setiawan, said over the weekend that they had to cannibalize due to the scarcity of train components, particularly for the electric commuter trains.

According to Tating, components for electric trains being repaired in the Manggarai Coach Train Workshop -- the largest train workshop in Southeast Asia -- have to be imported from other countries like Japan, South Korea, Germany and the Netherlands.

"Without cannibalizing the components, we cannot fulfill the demand of PT KAI as our supply of components is limited and often come late to the workshop," Tating told The Jakarta Post at an interview over the weekend.

He said supply of electric commuter train's components were often late due to various problems with procurement. If that fails, the supplies just do not come in, and it often does.

Based on the report issued by the workshop, it was currently burdened with repairing around 280 cars used on routes in Greater Jakarta.

Tating said that the workshop, which was founded in 1920 by Staat Spoor Wegen, the Netherlands railway company, received some three to four sets of electric trains or some 12 to 16 cars for repair every month, but its capacity was only two sets per month.

Other problems facing the train workshop, Tating said, is that the company has no electronic experts to deal with serious damage of the electricity trains.

He also said that the Manggarai Repair Shop's employees could not master electricity technology.

"If the damage is serious, we have to request mechanics from the state-owned National Electricity Institute of PT LEN as we have nobody with knowledge of electronics," said Tating.

Tating, however, said that there was no problem with repairing the coaches of diesel powered trains. He said the components have been produced locally by a company in East Java.

The train repair shop, which is locally known as Balai Yasa Manggarai receives some 50 to 60 cars used on diesel powered trains every month, while its capacity was only some 30 coaches.

The total of diesel powered cars being handled by the Manggarai Train Workshop is 1,238 cars. The cars serve the routes from Jakarta to other cities in Java.

The Manggarai workshop has 562 employees most of whom have a very low level of education: 63 dropped out after elementary school, 238 after junior high, only 232 high school graduates, 15 diploma III holders and just 14 university graduates.