Public sacrifices must not be squandered

Benget Simbolon Tnb., Jakarta

The government has asked the public for its understanding and readiness to make sacrifices following its decision to raise fuel prices by an average of 29 percent.

In announcing the decision on Monday evening, Coordinating Minister for the Economy Aburizal Bakrie said that the government had to make the decision to cut fuel subsidies, which have threatened fiscal sustainability.

With oil prices recently reaching US$50 per barrel on the world market, the subsidies may have shot up as high as Rp 73 trillion ($8.1 billion), he said.

The fuel price hike, he said, will encourage more efficient fuel usage, prevent fuel smuggling and lead to greater funding allocations for welfare programs. Poverty alleviation programs will be financed with the proceeds from the fuel price hike.

Unfortunately, not everybody sees it that way, as evident in initial opposition to the price hike.

A series of demonstrations across the archipelago have been staged, mostly by students, to protest the unpopular decision. If the government makes no effort to calm demonstrators and show its seriousness about reaching its goals, then the situation could snowball, causing political and economic instability.

Their real concern, actually, is not about whether the policy is a good one or not. Like similar protests, the fuel-price-hike protests are an expression of the demonstrators' concern as to how the social-safety net programs will be implemented, considering the country's reputation as one of the world's most corrupt countries.

Experience has told them that corrupt officials -- from regental to provincial level up to the central administration -- have derailed past welfare programs.

Take the rice for the poor program, for example. The World Bank said in its 2004 report that only 18 percent of the rice distributed under the program had reached the poor people across the archipelago.

In the eyes of the general public, all governments after the fall of former president Soeharto have failed to alleviate the suffering caused by the economic crisis.

They have been seeing "good" decisions taken one after the other. Every decision has given them reason for optimism, then dashed their hopes due to the poor implementation of the relevant programs.

While countries such as South Korea and Thailand recovered from the crisis, Indonesia has not managed to shake it off.

Indonesia continues to face ethnic conflicts, separatism, terrorism, corruption and a very poor legal system -- which all stands in the way of creating the conditions needed to attract foreign investors.

As a result, its economic growth during the last eight years moved at a snail's pace, from -13.68 (minus 13.68) percent in 1998 to 0.23 percent in 1999, 4.77 percent in 2000, 3.32 percent in 2001, 3.66 percent in 2002, 4.10 percent in 2003 and 5.13 percent in 2004. The average of the growth was still far below seven percent, which economists consider to be the minimum rate needed for it to absorb the increasing number of unemployed people into the workforce and thus to reduce the number of people living in poverty.

While a small number of the rich barely felt the impacts of the crisis, the vast majority of the population are acutely aware of its everyday repercussions. For many of them, the suffering has reached an unbearable level.

Susilo Bambang Yudhyono's election as President last year rekindled their hope. However, they will likely be disappointed again, as the President has, thus far, not succeeded in fulfilling his campaign promises to solve a number of pressing problems, including corruption cases, during his first 100 days in office.

Is there any hope left to cling to? Hope is all that could persuade the people that the sacrifices demanded of them are for the sake of something precious -- for the future of this nation. Nobody can answer this clearly, except the President himself.

This time he should strictly control the implementation of the policy so that his goals are achieved.

It is his job to see to it that the welfare programs that have been offered as compensation for the fuel price hike actually improve the lot of ordinary people, for whom "sacrifice" is no new thing.

The writer is a journalist of The Jakarta Post.