House drops plan to probe fuel price increases
Tony Hotland, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta
Opposition bloc in the House of Representatives was dealt a major blow as the legislative body voted on Tuesday against creating two special committees to inquire into the government's controversial fuel price hike policy and the auctioning of illegal sugar.
During a plenary session, the majority of all 10 factions in the House agreed not to set up the committees, saying the issues would already be further examined by existing House commissions.
A request to inquire into the government's fuel price hike policy was submitted in March after a group of legislators, most of them from the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P), opposed the rise.
The party has officially declared itself an opposition to the government of President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono.
A House member may request the creation of a special committee for an issue, with at least 11 legislators from two factions needed for the request to be brought to the plenary session. All House factions later on express their views on the motion.
At that time, the House agreed to accept the government's policy but insisted Cabinet members explain it to the House's finance commissions, especially the detail of how assistance packages for the poor in education and health care would be disbursed.
Three House factions -- the PDI-P, the National Awakening Party (PKB), and the Social Democratic Party (PDS) -- oppose the government's fuel hike policy, while other factions spearheaded by Vice President Jusuf Kalla's Golkar Party and Susilo's Democratic Party, support it.
The PKB, PDS and PDI-P also called for the special committee into the sugar smuggling case, which was considered by many to be marred by corruption and unfair competition.
About 56,000 tons of sugar was discovered after it was illegally imported from Thailand last year and some of it was later auctioned. House members filing the request said the auctions were often not transparent because they were not publicly announced and questioned the relatively low final auction prices of the sugar.
The auction process was overseen by the Attorney General's Office, which is alleged to have favored certain political interests.
The auction followed an instruction from Vice President Jusuf Kalla.
The Business Competition Supervisory Commission (KPPU) has launched an investigation into the auction process, which reportedly caused Rp 47.85 billion (US$4.87 million) in state losses as the tender winning company bought the sugar at a price below the price set by the Ministry of Trade.
KKPU, however, was silent about the fact that the North Jakarta District Court which administered the auction gave only four days to companies to take part in the auction. The auction was made public through a local Jakarta newspaper.
While agreeing that the process was questionable, the House voted that it should be examined in more detail by the Commission III on legal affairs and Commission VI on trade and industry.
In the same session, the House formed three working committees to deliberate three bills with the government -- the 2005-2025 national development planning bill; the disaster mitigation bill; and the bill on the government regulation in lieu of law No. 1/2005 on industrial disputes resolution.