Timor sends only 100 supervisors to Kia plant: Tunky

JAKARTA (JP): Industry and Trade Minister Tunky Ariwibowo said yesterday PT Timor Putra Nasional needed to send only 100 trainees to its South Korean joint venture partner, Kia Motors Corp.

"Since Timor only needs to train supervisors at the Kia plant, the company therefore should not send more than 100," Tunky asserted after a meeting with President Soeharto.

He was commenting on a statement by House member Ni Gusti Ayu Eka Sukmadewi at a House Budgetary Commission hearing on Wednesday.

Sukmadewi, who visited Korea for a week last August with other House members, reported that her mission could not find any Indonesian workers at Kia's car plant and that she had learnt later from Kia executives that the plant employed only three Indonesians.

Sukmadewi alleged at the hearing that Kia Motors had dumped defective cars in Indonesia which were sold here for more than three times the Korean market price.

Tunky said President Soeharto had asked him about yesterday's negative media reports on the Timor car, which the government has classified as a national automobile.

Tunky said he could not comment on Sukmadewi's statements on Wednesday until he had verified the findings of the House delegation.

Presidential Instruction No.42/1996 stipulates that Timor can import fully-assembled cars from Kia with exemptions from import duties and luxury sales taxes if Indonesian workers help assemble them and they contain some Indonesian components.

"But the definition of Indonesian workers in the ruling does not necessarily mean direct employment of Indonesian workers. It can mean indirect participation by Indonesian workers in the Kia plant as trainees or apprentices," Tunky said.

The supervisors sent to Kia's plant would later supervise or train assembly-line workers at Timor's plant (still to be built in West Java), he added.

Timor has said it would send between 1,000 and 2,000 workers to Kia's plant to learn how to assemble Timor cars.

Timor's spokesman Mochamad Irchan asserted Wednesday that his company had sent four batches of 100 trainees to Kia's plant since March.

Tunky said Sukmadewi's allegation, that Kia was shipping defective cars to Indonesia, was groundless.

"I think Kia Motors, as a major car exporter, will not damage its international reputation by sending defective cars to Indonesia," Tunky asserted.

He said he found it extremely difficult to believe that a company with an international reputation sold defective products overseas. (vin)