House urges govt to name polluters

Moch. N. Kurniawan, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

The House of Representatives called on the government to announce immediately the final report on an audit (PROPER) of companies which are allegedly polluting the environment to help uphold the law on the environment and avoid raising any suspicions of collusion among the public.

Irwan Prayitno, chairman of Commission VIII on oil, gas, mining and the environment, said any delay in the announcement of the audit's results would raise questions among the public.

"If PROPER's results are final, the government should announce it to the public. It will be very good for public to know which companies comply with the law on the environment and those polluting the environment," said Irwan when asked on Monday to comment on the government's delay in announcing the result.

State Minister for the Environment Nabiel Makarim disclosed to the commission last week that the environmental audit was finished but he declined to identify the polluting companies.

PROPER is conducted annually to encourage companies, especially the ones using pollutants in their raw materials, to help preserve the environment. The government has also conducted a clean river program (Prokasih) to discourage companies from dumping toxic waste into the rivers.

Non-governmental organizations and environmentalists have urged the public not to buy products produced by polluting companies.

Nabiel also expressed disappointment over the findings, saying many companies had poor management of waste water for numerous reasons.

Based on the PROPER's result, the government will rank the companies, depending on their performance in managing their waste. Companies complying with the law in managing their waste will be awarded gold and green environment labels while companies polluting the environment will be given red and black labels.

Nabiel said there had been a growing trend since the 1998 economic crisis for companies to pay less attention to protecting the environment.

Nabiel said that many factories in Java no longer complied with the law on the environment in managing their waste due to increased overall costs.

Julius Bobo, member of Commission VIII, said the government should start imposing sanctions on polluting companies to encourage other companies to comply with the law.

"There is no reason for the government to delay the announcement of the list of polluting companies for another two months as the result is final," he said.

The government faces a dilemma in identifying the polluting companies because the audit was conducted randomly and the government had run short of equipment to examine the serious impacts of polluting companies' waste water on the environment.

Many companies declared as polluters, are expected to object to the environmental audit, since not all companies were examined thoroughly.

The government examined only 85 of thousands of companies across the country

Hermien Roosita, an assistant to the environment minister on environmental conservation, conceded that her office had carried out a limited examination of certain companies.

"We just want PROPER's results to be perfect," she said.