Govt to select officials for Bapeptal

The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

The Ministry of Energy and Mineral Resources has started selecting candidates to sit on the newly-established power market regulator, a senior ministry official said at the weekend.

Luluk Sumiarso, the head of the selection committee for the Electricity Market Regulatory Board (Bapeptal) said the ministry would start vetting 31 candidates next week.

"We will conduct psychological tests and interviews to get the 10 best candidates. We expect the selection to be completed before the end of this month," Luluk, who is also a secretary- general at the ministry, told The Jakarta Post.

The names of the ten best candidates will be submitted to President Megawati Soekarnoputri before they undergo selection tests by the House of Representatives.

The selection tests will produce five officials for the power board, whose tasks will include setting electricity prices and controlling competition in the country's soon-to-be liberalized power market.

The candidates come from various educational backgrounds, including economics, law and electronic engineering.

Luluk said the shortlisting process for the power board would be open to public scrutiny.

"We recognize that the public wants to know how much the candidates understand about issues involving electricity. We will try to make the process transparent," Luluk said.

Luluk did not say exactly when the board would be established, although he said "the sooner the better".

The new board will play a crucial role in opening up the country's power sector in line with the Electricity Law, No. 20/2002. In the long run, it aims to end the decade-long monopoly of state-owned electricity company PT Perusahaan Listrik Negara (PLN).

The liberalization is expected to attract foreign investors but critics said scrapping the PLN monopoly would lead to an increase in electricity prices and eventually hurt consumers.

The free market scheme will not be imposed throughout the country, but only in selected areas termed as "competitive zones", where electricity demand is high.

Java-Bali and the industrial island of Batam are tipped to be the first regions to apply the free-market scheme given these regions' high demand for electricity.

The Electricity Law stipulates that private companies will be allowed to generate power and sell directly to the public in the competition zones. They will have the right to set up their own distribution and transmission networks in cooperation with the government or to use the state-owned network now operated by PLN.