Differences over monorail widens
Bambang Nurbianto, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta
The prolonged dispute between the shareholders of PT Jakarta Monorail (JM) over who will supply the monorail trains and support technology threatens to further delay the US$650 million project.
The dispute revolves around the desire of Indonesian Transit Central (ITC) to name a consortium of local companies to supply the trains and technology, while Omnico Singapore Pte Ltd. insists on using South Korea's Rotem technology.
In a media conference on Friday, Omnico, which holds 45 percent of the shares of JM, denied statements made by officials of the Jakarta administration and ITC about Rotem.
The statements, according to Omnico chairman Abdul Rahman, insinuated that the technology offered by the South Korean company was too expensive and that the company wanted too much money for the project.
Governor Sutiyoso has previously supported ITC's desire to appoint local companies to supply the trains for the monorail project using technology provided by Siemens of Germany.
According to ITC president director Ruslan Diwirjo, this would lower the total cost of the project to less than $500 million, much lower than the estimated cost of $826 million using Rotem's magnetic levitation (Maglev) technology.
Abdul Rahman flatly denied these figures, saying the actual cost of the project using Rotem's technology would be about $540 million.
He also denied that Omnico had made several other demands, including a government subsidy and equity, plus the inclusion of 60 percent of the turnover from electronic road pricing (ERP) in the project's costs.
He also said the ticket prices for the two planned monorail lines would be in the hands of the city administration and would not be determined by the ultimate cost of the project.
The monorail system will consist of two lines. The first line, to be called the Green Line, would link the business districts of Kuningan and Sudirman in South Jakarta, while the second line, to be called the Blue Line, would serve a less lucrative corridor from Kampung Melayu in East Jakarta to the Taman Anggrek shopping center in West Jakarta.
Abdul Rahman stressed that PT Jakarta Monorail had not yet made any decision about who would supply the monorail trains and the supporting technology.
"Omnico particularly regrets the various recent reports in the media of statements by unauthorized persons about the company's involvement in the Jakarta Monorail project; statements which we consider one-sided and which seriously misrepresent our position," he said.
He was referring to the appointment by ITC of the Indonesia Consortium of Monorail Industries (ICMI), led by the Bukaka Group.
ICMI includes state rolling stock maker PT INKA and state electronics firm PT LEN Industry.
Abdul Rahman stressed that Omnico preferred Maglev technology, which he said had undergone 15 years of design development, engineering, testing and operation.
He doubted the capability of ICMI to manufacture monorail technology with superior safety systems after only several months of manufacturing.
Meanwhile, ITC director Sukmawaty Syukur said the selection of the local consortium as the rolling stock supplier was final because JM had signed an agreement with the city administration.
She played down Abdul Rahman's hesitation about the ability of the consortium to create a safe monorail system.
According to Sukmawaty, she had documents about Omnico offers, including project costs and a request for part of the ERP turnover.
"They can deny, but we have evidence," she told The Jakarta Post by phone.