City Council and PDAM reach compromise solution on water
City Council and PDAM reach compromise solution on water
JAKARTA (JP): The City Council and the City Water Company,
PDAM Jaya, finally reached a compromise late Wednesday night by
agreeing that the current price for water from public water tanks
will not be raised until a price ceiling is introduced.
A dispute had erupted last week when PDAM Jaya, without first
consulting the council, raised the water price on water from
public water tanks by 200 percent to Rp 780 (US$.36 cents) per
cubic meter, beginning this month.
"We can fully understand why the City Water Company must
increase the water price at public water tanks," Helmy A.R.
Syihab, the chairman of the City Council's Commission C, told
reporters yesterday.
"By saying this, we mean that PDAM Jaya should add to the
number of new public water tanks throughout the city,
particularly in areas still not served by PDAM Jaya," Helmy said.
"We also hope that PDAM Jaya will formulate a policy on a
reference price for water taken from public tanks and have it
legalized by the governor. That way it can be checked just like
the government checks the price of rice," he said.
Helmy added that the reference price should serve as a
controlling tool to ensure that the water is not sold at higher
than the ceiling price.
The council also demanded that PDAM Jaya refrain from
adjusting the current price until a ceiling price is set.
According to Helmy, this means that PDAM Jaya must accept
payments made for public water tank water, even though it is
still at the current rate of Rp 390 per meter cubic.
In addition, Helmy said, the council deemed it necessary for
PDAM Jaya to hold a meeting with all owners and operators of
public water tanks to explain why it must resort to the price
hike.
Debate
During the debate, the City Council insisted that the price
hike runs counter to the one it recently approved, that is, from
Rp 250 per cubic meter to the current price of Rp 390, which
became effective last month.
The council, represented by Commission C and D on finance and
economic affairs, also expressed concern over the hike because
public water tanks are a source of potable tap water for people
of middle to low income brackets.
These people used to buy it in cans from door-to-door water
vendors. When water was sold by PDAM Jaya at Rp 250 per cubic
meter to owners of public water tanks, these owners used to sell
it at Rp 5 per can to water vendors who, in turn, used to sell a
can of water for Rp 25.
The City Water Company PDAM Jaya, on the other hand,
maintained that it had to increase the price to meet its
financial obligations to the International Bank for
Reconstruction and Development (IBRD) and Overseas Economic
Cooperation Fund (OECF) from which it borrowed a total of Rp 1.4
trillion (US$652 million) to finance the construction of several
water plants across the city.
PDAM Jaya also argued that the price hike was necessary to
finance the construction of new public water tanks throughout the
city, to better serve around 65 percent of the city's population
whom the water company is still unable to reach out.
In response to the compromise, Mohamad Yani of the Indonesian
Consumer Foundation, told The Jakarta Post that PDAM Jaya should
seek other alternatives before resorting to a price hike.
PDAM Jaya could bottle water and sell it, just as the City
Water Company of Bogor, West Java, does. With the income it would
receive from selling bottled water, PDAM Jaya would not have to
increase the price of water from public water tanks, Yani said.
(arf)