Economic recovery must be top priority: Kadin

Economic recovery must be top priority: Kadin

JAKARTA (JP): The Indonesian Chamber of Commerce and Industry
(Kadin) reminded the government yesterday to keep a tight focus
on restoring the country's economy despite its political reform
commitment.

The chamber's chairman Aburizal Bakrie said political progress
in the country was heartening but he warned the nation not to
divert its attention from rehabilitating the ailing economy.

"Try not to be too enchanted with political issues only, the
economy is very crucial because it involves the lives of many
people," Aburizal, popularly known as Ical, told reporters.

"Many people cannot afford to buy food, millions have lost
their jobs, businesses can no longer operate, malls and offices
will be closed. This is incredibly heavy on both our micro and
macro economies."

Ical said the country was still in dire straits, and it needed
considerable funds to finance the recovery process.

These would be extremely hard to find, he added, because the
country had lost confidence of both the domestic and
international communities.

The government must concentrate on regaining the confidence,
he said.

Ical criticized the current overwhelming trend of politicking
in the country, although Kadin agreed with the openness and
political reforms.

"People are like a pendulum. Back when expressing opinions was
not as free, everyone just let (former president Soeharto) Pak
Harto do the speaking, now everyone wants to be heard, even those
whose field of expertise is not politics."

Kadin backed calls for a special session of the parliament to
elect a new president, the establishment of new laws on the
political system and a general election.

For the time being, however, the nation must also take the
economy into account as a matter of survival, he said.

"The question is: can we live for another six months?" he
asked.

Kadin had formed a Supporting Team for the Economic Reform
Implementation, headed by one of its executives A.A. Baramuli.

It will assess the economic reform implementation and will
help the government in policy-making decisions.

Baramuli said the team would establish a six-month term
program to rehabilitate and reconstruct the current production
distribution and marketing system of the economy.

"It is clear that the national economic fundamentals are
frail, in contrary to what people might have thought before, and
this condition had contributed to the crisis," he said.

Baramuli said the current focus on politics could threaten the
extremely susceptible supply of essentials.

"Politics is not only in Jakarta, there are thousands of
islands in the country, what happen to the people in those areas?

"They are in worse pain."

He said the progress in politics must not result in the
decline in the economy.

Ical said the government must began evaluating some of the
policies of the current system.

For example, the subsidy in wheat must be lifted as it only
benefited certain groups, he said.

He advised subsidies should instead be allocated for the
supply of rice.

They should be given for products which contain local
materials to benefit local farmers and expand the shrinking area
of rice fields, he said. (das)