Government's decision to permit Indorayon to reopen sparks protests
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.