Government's decision to permit Indorayon to reopen sparks protests
Apriadi Gunawan, The Jakarta Post, Medan
More protests and violence are clouding the North Sumatra town of Porsea as local people opposed the central government's decision to give a green light for pulp and paper company PT Inti Indorayon Utama to resume its operation after its temporary closure due to its controversial environmental problems.
Ompu Monang, chairman of the Toba-Batak Forum (Parbato), slammed the government for allowing Indorayon to resume operation, saying its means the central government does not listening to the Porsea people's grievance in the past.
He warned that the pulp mill's operation resumption would certainly met a strong resistance from the people in Toba-Samosir Regency although it would claim more and more human lives.
"The government must be held responsible for any negative impacts raised by its decision and the company's reoperation," he told the local press in the North Sumatra's capital of Medan on Tuesday.
North Sumatra Governor Tengku Rizal Nurdin said on Tuesday that the decision to allow Indorayon to resume operation was made in a recent cabinet meeting presided over by President Megawati Soekarnoputri in Jakarta.
"All ministers attending the cabinet meeting gave their support unanimously for the pulp factory's reoperation," he said.
A senior official at the Ministry of Trade and Industry who asked for anonymity confirmed the cabinet meeting's decision and said that the decision had been also followed up by North Sumatra officials with Trade and Industry Minister Rini S. Suwandi in Jakarta recently.
Governor Nurdin also acknowledged that he had called on the central government to hold dialogs with the local elite in Toba- Samosir to win their supports for the decision and to avoid unwanted things if the company resumed operation.
"The political supports from the people in Toba-Samosir Regency is absolutely needed because not the central government nor the governor but the Toba-Samosir regent would be held responsible for all things caused by the decision," he said.
The governor said further that the pulp mill would resume operation with a new name PT Toba Pulp Lestari and a new pledge to minimize environmental deterioration and run a social development program to empower local people living around the factory.
The decision to halt temporarily the company's operation was taken by former president Abdurrahman Wahid by the end of 2000 to help bury all controversies around the company's presence in Porsea.
Dozens of people have been killed in a series of demonstrations held, following former president Soeharto's resignation in May, 1998, to oppose the factory's presence in the small town locate at the bank of Asahan River flowing from Lake Toba.
The company's presence has been opposed since it was held responsible for the decreasing level of the lake and the looting of forests in the province. Besides being found of dumping its poisonous waste water directly to the river, the company had also polluted the air and caused lung diseases to people living near the factory.
The factory owned by Sukamto Tanoto under the Radja Garuda Mas Group was established with the capital of US$600 million in 1986. The publicly-listed company had offered its shares to the public at the capital markets in Jakarta and New York. Its pulp and paper products were exported to European countries, Japan and United States.
Sukamto also has a similar pulp and paper factory in Riau but its presence has not raised any problems to both local people and the environment.