Govt raises its target for telephone lines

JAKARTA (JP): The government says it will install even more telephone lines during the ongoing Sixth Five-Year Development Plan period to end in March 1999, raising its previous target for new telephone lines by 54 percent from five million to 7.7 million.

Director General of Post and Telecommunications Djakaria Purawidjaja told a seminar on public relations at the Ministry of Tourism, Post and Telecommunications yesterday that the new target included 6.7 million fixed-telephone lines and a network capacity for one million mobile telephones.

"We have seen that the telecommunications industry in the country is developing well," he said.

He said mobile cellular operators were also confident that the number of their subscribers would increase rapidly in coming years.

"I have just received a report that there are now 450,000 cellular phone users in Indonesia, compared to 400,000 users last week," he said.

Seven mobile cellular telephone operators run three systems in Indonesia -- the Nordic Mobile Telephone system is operated by PT Mobisel, the Global System for Mobile Communications (GSM) is operated by PT Satelindo, PT Telkomsel and PT Excelcomindo and the Advanced Mobile Phone System is operated by PT Metrosel, PT Telekomindo and PT Komselindo.

Djakaria said that increasing the number of mobile cellular telephone subscribers to one million by March 1999 was realistic.

The government plans to license a number of new mobile cellular operators of the Personal Handy-phone system and the Digital Cordless System 1800 next year.

Djakaria said the ministry aimed to increase the country's telephone density to four fixed-telephone lines for every 100 people by 1998, to 10 lines per 100 people by 2000 and to 20 lines per 100 people by 2020.

There are now only five million telephone lines in Indonesia for a population of almost 200 million.

In Singapore there are 46 telephone lines for every 100 people, 13 lines for every 100 in Thailand and 6.5 lines for every 100 in Malaysia.

State-owned PT Telkom and its five contractors are in charge of telephone-line installation. They are to install at least 2.2 million fixed-telephone lines, and operate them and the existing lines in five different regions under 15-year joint-operation contracts signed in October last year.

Telkom's President Asman A. Nasution said yesterday the company projected an annual growth rate of 19 percent in its revenue and 21 percent in it profit until 2001.

In August, Telkom reported a 44.91 percent increase in its profit to Rp 701.82 billion (US$299.41 million) in the first half of 1996 over the same period of last year, while its operating revenue rose 22 percent to Rp 945.7 billion.

Nasution said his company intended to install 13.88 million new telephone lines by 2001.

He said that by 2001, Telkom aimed to reduce the waiting period for new telephone lines to less than three days. Customers now wait several weeks for new lines.

Telkom has launched a self-drive program, called T-2001, to boost its performance to become a world-class operator by the year 2001. (icn)