'Foreign-trip fever' strikes councillors

'Foreign-trip fever' strikes councillors

Ainur R. Sophiaan, The Jakarta Post, Surabaya

Overseas trips have reached epidemic proportions in the East Java
provincial legislative council with many councillors having
accepted invitations from the provincial administration to
undertake "comparative studies" abroad.

Seven members of the legislative council's Commission E on
social welfare are planning their fifth foreign trip to conduct
comparative studies, this time in Hong Kong and the Philippines.

Harbiah Salahuddin, a member of the commission, said she along
with six other councillors would travel to the two countries to
learn first hand how Indonesian migrant workers were treated in
Hong Kong, and how the Philippines had managed to speed up its
labor export procedures.

"The comparative study is needed because the majority of
Indonesian workers employed overseas are from the province (East
Java)," she said.

She declined to reveal the amount of funds that had been
allocated by the provincial legislature for the trip.

Saleh Ismail Mukadar, a member of the council's Commission A
on public administration, also revealed that his commission was
planning an overseas trip to conduct comparative studies on
administrative practices in a number of countries.

"Many invitations for foreign trips from the executive have
reached our commission, but we have accepted only this one
because it is considered quite important for our efforts to
develop democracy in the local administration," he said.

The council also discussed recently the provincial
administration's invitations for three comparative studies to
Australia, the Netherlands, and several Southeast Asian countries
respectively.

Lutfillah Masduki, another member of the commission, admitted
that "foreign-trip fever" had the councillors in thrall. He said
that many members of the council had already undertaken similar
missions to Malaysia, Singapore, Hong Kong and Thailand, but that
so far no steps had been taken to improve labor conditions in the
province.

"Numerous groups of legislators have used the excuse of
comparative studies in various countries as opportunities to go
on junkets and have a good time at the state's expense, while all
the time ignoring the numerous problems facing the province," he
said, adding that the funds spent on foreign trips actually
belonged to the people.

An alliance of 18 non-governmental organizations have filed a
class action suit against a number of councillors who went on
comparative studies to Batam, Singapore and Malaysia earlier this
year as the trips were considered to have been a waste of
taxpayers' money.

Ismail Saleh Mukadar, also a councillor, said that he along
with other members of the council were trying to reject the
invitations as too many councillors had made too many foreign
trips for comparative study purposes this year.

"If the invitations have to be accepted, then the trips should
be taken next year," he said, warning that despite the
invitations, the legislative council still had to chip in, at
least as far as councillors' expenses while abroad were
concerned.