Get serious about poverty, SBY says
Get serious about poverty, SBY says
Rendi A. Witular, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta
President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono told government officials to leave their comfortable offices and go into the field to see the real situation the country's poor faced.
"I ask all government officials, including ... the Vice President, governors, regents and mayors, to frequently visit remote areas around the country," Susilo said at the State Palace on Wednesday. The President also promised to personally visit poor people to listen to their concerns.
Susilo made the appeal during a ceremony where Coordinating Minister for People's Welfare Alwi Shihab and Bank Indonesia Governor Burhanuddin Abdullah signed an agreement on poverty eradication, which would empower medium- and small-scale enterprises.
The President called on government officials to stay longer with residents in remote or poverty-stricken areas instead of only visiting for a couple of hours and flying home.
"Go to the poor areas and feel their suffering," Susilo said, adding that he was born and raised in a poor village in Pacitan, East Java.
Susilo said he always stayed for at least one night when he visited disadvantaged or disaster-stricken regions such as Nabire in Papua and Aceh.
"I have slept inside tents. I was shaken by and empathized with the poor conditions people in the area (Nabire) faced," Susilo said.
The poor were usually more patient and accepting of their plight and were not demanding, Susilo said. Such modest behavior should spur government officials on to find a solution to improve their welfare, he said.
"I observe that (officials) still lack awareness and a desire to improve public welfare. Government officials without such a desire have no idea what they should do for people," he said.
Alwi, meanwhile, said poverty was a collective problem for the central government and local administrations. It was impossible for the chief welfare minister alone to be help the country without inter-government cooperation, he said.
Alwi said he would accompany donor organizations to visit West and East Nusa Tenggara to examine what caused the recent cases of child malnutrition there.
The cases showed that malnutrition did not only occur in poor areas but sometimes in regions where food was abundant, he said.
Alwi also suggested that in some situations, irresponsible parents, not poverty or local body indifference, were to blame for child malnutrition.
"It may have been the (local) culture that caused malnutrition, such as a mother who insists on having gold bracelets but leaves her children malnourished," Alwi said.