Pelni operates new ship to ship to serve Jakarta-Medan
JAKARTA (JP): The state-owned PT Pelni shipping company will start sailing a new passenger liner, Bukit Siguntang, later this week to link Jakarta and Medan with 25-percent discounted fares for the next two weeks.
The ship, the 17th in Pelni's passenger fleet, was built by Jos L. Meyer GmbH & Co. of Germany with finance from the German government.
Minister of Transportation Haryanto Dhanutirto launched the ship at Tanjung Priok port yesterday.
The ship -- 146.50 meters long, 23.40 meters wide and weighing 3,375 deadweight tons -- can carry 2,003 passengers. It cost Pelni DM 147.28 million.
"Since the purchase contract was based on a counter-trade arrangement, Jos L. Meyer was required to import DM 130.36 million worth of various commodities from Indonesia," Agus Rudianto, the secretary of the Directorate General of Sea Transportation, reported to Haryanto yesterday.
He said the new vessel would serve the Jakarta-Medan route four times a week.
Agus said the Bukit Sigutang, named after a mountain in South Sumatra, was one of 20 similar passenger liners ordered from Jos L. Meyer. Seventeen have already been delivered.
He said the 18th ship, to be christened Lambelu, would be delivered next year.
"The building of the 19th and the 20th ships is scheduled to be completed in May and December 1998, respectively " he said.
Pelni also plans to order four more 500-seat Palindo passenger liners from the state-owned shipyard PT PAL in Surabaya.
Pelni began operating a similar Palindo ship, worth DM 38 million, last September.
Pelni expects to transport 5,422,000 passengers this year, up from 5,394,244 passengers last year.
Regional routes
Minister Haryanto said yesterday the government planned to award more regional routes to Pelni, which has a regional service linking Davao in the Philippines with Bali via Sulawesi.
"We are still studying the routes," Haryanto said, without giving anymore detail.
Pelni president Roesman Anwar reported to the minister that regional routes linking Indonesia and its neighboring countries, notably the ports in growth-triangle regions, were promising for Pelni.
"Since the government has decided to abolish the exit tax for Indonesians traveling to the Malaysian, Philippine and Singapore areas in the growth-triangle cooperation regions, the sea transport services to those areas will be highly promising," Anwar noted.
There are 18 Indonesian provinces in the three subregional economic cooperation areas, called growth triangles, which are being developed under the Association of South East Asian Nation (ASEAN).
The subregional economic cooperation areas include the Indonesia-Malaysia-Thailand Growth Triangle, the Indonesia- Malaysia-Singapore Growth Triangle and the Brunei-Indonesia- Malaysia-Philippines East ASEAN Growth Area.
Anwar said Pelni also planned to operate its own passenger terminal in Tanjung Priok because many passengers had complained about the poor service at the present terminal.
"The complaints should not have been addressed to us because the terminal is managed by PT Pelabuhan Indonesia II, the state- owned seaport management company," Anwar added. (icn)