Govt pressure Sutiyoso to settle Hotel Mulia case
Govt pressure Sutiyoso to settle Hotel Mulia case
JAKARTA (JP): The government urged Governor Sutiyoso yesterday
to insist that the owners of Hotel Mulia immediately pay their Rp
20.5 billion (US$1.7 million) fine for building the hotel
two-and-a-half times higher than their permits allowed.
The City municipality, if necessary, could take legal action
against the hotel's owners, which include former president
Soeharto's second son Bambang Trihatmodjo, Minister of Sports and
Youth Affairs Agung Laksono told reporters.
"It's the Hotel Mulia management's moral responsibility. I
believe they knew that they violated the rules but they just
ignored it," Agung said.
He suggested the governor and his city administration set a
firm deadline, or, if necessary, require payment without delay.
The city administration could endorse immediate and
transparent measures against the hotel's management without any
hesitation, Agung said.
Since Soeharto resigned demands have mounted for all covert
cases to be resolved and not be allowed to pile up, he added.
"They're (the ownership of the hotel) all well-educated
people, they must have known their rights and their duties,"
Agung stressed.
The management and contractor of the five-star hotel, the
Mulia Group, was fined last year for violating 1975 bylaw No. 4
on high-rise buildings and 1985 bylaw No. 9 on building height
regulations.
Based on the block plan approved for the hotel project, signed
jointly by former Jakarta governor Surjadi Soedirja and the then
state secretary/minister Moerdiono, the owners were allowed to
construct a 16-story structure.
The owners -- the Jakarta Country Club and the Mulia Group --
however, proceeded to construct a 40-story tower.
The Jakarta Country Club is a subsidiary of the 1997 Southeast
Asian (SEA) Games Consortium, chaired by Bambang, that financed
the biannual regional sporting extravaganza. Another major
shareholder is National Sports Council Chairman Wismoyo
Arismunandar.
None of the hotel's owners were available for comment
yesterday and the management refused to discuss the issue.
Former governor Surjadi at first warned the group over the
violation but subsequently backtracked by letting the
construction proceed on the grounds that the hotel was badly
required to accommodate participants of the 19th SEA Games held
last October.
Added to the scorn, the hotel was also said to have been
constructed on a plot owned by the Gelora Senayan Management
Board, according to the board's executive director Yasidi
Hambali.
The hotel has a permit to build and use the construction but
still has to pay the ground rent to the board, Yasidi said
yesterday.
He, however, admitted the board had never reminded the hotel's
owners about the long-delayed rent fees as the board thought the
issue could be settled later.
Yasidi could not reveal the total rent owed by the hotel,
which occupies part of the board's 260-hectare plot in the
Senayan area.
Round-the-clock construction ensured completion of the tower
before the Games' opening. Soeharto himself inaugurated the
1,008-room hotel before the athletes arrived for the Games. (emf)