Semen Padang still owned by govt: Official

Semen Padang still owned by govt: Official

Tantri Yuliandini, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

Office of the State Minister for State Owned Enterprises
secretary Bacelius Ruru on Thursday condemned the West Sumatra
administration for its unilateral action in claiming ownership
over cement producer PT Semen Padang.

"This takeover (of the company) cannot happen because legally
Semen Padang is still owned by the central government," he told
reporters here.

Bacelius was responding to reports that a decree had earlier
been issued by the West Sumatra administration claiming that
Semen Padang, a subsidiary of state-owned PT Semen Gresik, was
owned by the people of West Sumatra.

Protests against foreign ownership of Semen Padang and another
Semen Gresik unit, PT Semen Tonasa in South Sulawesi, have long
been disrupting the government's efforts to sell a majority stake
in the state-owned company to Mexican-based cement giant Cemex SA
de CV. Cemex already owns a 25 percent stake in Semen Gresik.

The government had planned to sell 51 percent of Semen Gresik,
which would bring in around US$520 million, or some 80 percent of
the government's privatization target of Rp 6.5 trillion (about
$634 million) this year.

So far, the privatization program has yielded nothing and the
government has come under pressure to start raising proceeds to
help plug the budget deficit.

But the protests have caused the initial Oct. 26 deadline for
the sale to be extended until Dec. 14 to give time for the
government to evaluate the impact of the sale.

Bacelius said that the West Sumatra administration should let
the government's special privatization team, established by
President Megawati Soekarnoputri, review the matter to achieve
the most equitable solution.

"Because a (one-sided) takeover will only give rise to legal
complications," he said, explaining that these complications
would arise because the publicly-listed Semen Gresik was owned
not only by the government, but also private investors.

Bacelius said that the West Sumatra administration could rest
assured that its grievances would be taken into consideration.

Separately, PT Cemex Indonesia president Francisco Noriega
said that it was up to the shareholders to make a statement and
that it was crucial that the government, as the major
shareholder, made an official statement.

"I think it is the government that has to give an opinion at
this time," he said.