Council insists city provide expert staff

Bambang Nurbianto, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

City Council members demanded that Governor Sutiyoso immediately issue a gubernatorial decree on the provision of expert staff for the councillors as stipulated in a newly endorsed bylaw on the councillors' financial status and benefits.

Sayogo Hendrosubroto of the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P) faction said on Saturday that the presence of the staff was of high importance.

"Councillors have to have experts because they must deal with various issues. Councillors do not have a comprehensive understanding of all the issues they deal with," Sayogo, who is also chairman of Commission D on development affairs, told The Jakarta Post.

Councillor Inggard Joshua of Golkar faction added that the experts would ease the burden of their work.

The appointment of the experts is regulated in Article 18 of the bylaw approved on Friday.

According to the article, the experts will be the subordinates of the council secretary whose duty is to help the five commissions of the Council.

The five commissions are Commission A on legal and administrative affairs, Commission B on economic affairs, Commission C on financial affairs, Commission D on development affairs, and Commission E on education, health, and people's welfare.

The bylaw, however, does not specify numbers, qualifications and salaries of the experts. According to the third paragraph of Article 18, the details would be stipulated in a gubernatorial decree.

Currently, councillors are not provided with a secretary or any staff. If they do have any, councillors have to pay them from their own salaries.

Meanwhile, each member of the House of Representatives is provided with one expert and a regular staffer, who is appointed by respected legislator. Most of the assistants are the legislators' relatives.

According to Inggard, his faction has hired three expert staff to help seven Golkar councillors to study various issues and texts, including thousands of pages of a draft bylaw on the city budget for 2005 currently being deliberated.

He said the experts with under graduate decrees in law and finance were paid around Rp 2 million (US$222.22) to Rp 2.5 million per month. "So far, we have paid them from our own salaries," he said.

Inggard expressed hope that the City Council secretary would recruit experts in the proper way and with specific qualifications.

Muhayar Rustamudin of the Prosperous Justice Party (PKS) faction also said that each councillor of his faction hired one expert, who held a master's degree.

Therefore, he expected the Governor to consider letting each councillors -- not each commission as stipulated in the bylaw -- to have their own expert staff.

"If the salaries are taken from the city budget, it will reduce the burden of the councillors, who have to put aside part of their own salary to pay the experts we have hired," he said.