Civil servants left with no uniforms

BOGOR (JP): Several Bogor mayoralty civil servants are complaining they have not received their designated uniforms since 1994.

Prominent among their concerns is the fate of the budget allotment for the uniforms, which they say mayoralty officials always claim to have spent.

"The last uniform we got was five years ago. Then, where does the fund go every year?" one of the employees said on Tuesday.

He pointed to his uniform, which he said dated back five years.

Mayoralty officials denied employees were left with old uniforms.

Spokesman Hari Harsono said there was no scam in the fund for the clothes, which amounted to between Rp 200 million and Rp 250 million per annum.

He insisted that all the civil servants in the mayoralty received their uniforms in the fiscal years 1994/1995 and 1995/1996.

Showing a document, Hari said: "You can see here that all of them signed this paper, stating they received the clothes."

The supply of uniforms to mayoralty staff was halted in the 1996/1997 fiscal year because the fund was reallocated for the uniforms of the town's non-civil service employees, including workers hired by the local public order agency, cleaning service workers and members of the town music corps.

Fund allotment for civil servants was reinstated in the 1997/1998 fiscal year.

"As many as 6,728 civil servants received the uniforms by February last year," Hari said.

"This year, we have so far received no budget for their uniforms." (24/jun)