House urges govt to resolve fuel shortage, corruption
House urges govt to resolve fuel shortage, corruption
The Jakarta Post, Jakarta
The House of Representatives wrapped up its fourth session on
Friday and issued scores of recommendations to the government
with regards to fresh social issues.
The House hosted its last plenary session on Friday before its
members go on trips to their constituents during a month-long
recess, supposedly to familiarize them with how the House works
when it is in session.
Only around 252 of its 550 members bothered to show up on
Friday based on the attendance list, a figure that dropped to
less than 120 after a prayer break.
The House will reconvene on Aug. 15.
During the session, it urged the government to immediately
take appropriate actions to solve the problem of fuel scarcity,
which has created hardships among the people in the form of
soaring prices.
"We ask the government to quickly find solutions to this
problem because it has a great effect on the public and causing a
high-cost economy," House Speaker Agung Laksono said in his
closing speech.
Concerning graft practices, the House underlined fresh cases
discovered at state institutions, including the banking sector,
Ministry of Religious Affairs and judiciary.
"We're deeply concerned about this, and demand all parties
with the authority to step up coordination among themselves to
avoid overlapping and come up with maximum results," Agung said.
This, he said, should be accompanied with a time limit to
arrest the alleged perpetrators and optimizing the return of lost
state assets.
Furthermore, Agung said, the House would push the government
to focus its attention on working to resolve the emerging cases
of diseases, such as polio, and malnutrition problems among
children across the country.
"This is a national issue, and swift action is more than
essential to minimize the possibility of a lost generation," he
said.
The House endorsed the regulation in lieu of law No. 1/2005 on
the postponement of Law No. 2/2004 on industrial conflict
resolution.
It joined the revision of Law No. 36/2004 on 2005 state budget
to become the only two bills that the House managed to endorse so
far.
The House is scheduled to complete deliberation on 55 bills by
December.
It currently is in the early stages of deliberating several
bills with the government, including the national long-term
development program 2005-2025, and mineral and coal mining.
Other bills on sports, on teachers, on witness protection and
on the ombudsman have been drafted by the House and would later
be deliberated with the government.
The House closed its fourth session with the controversy about
the planned whopping increases in its members' allowances, which
have both been criticized by many.