Transmigrants now fly in style

Transmigrants now fly in style

JAKARTA (JP): Twenty-five families left from the Halim
Perdanakusumah airport yesterday on board a commercial Boeing
737-200 plane from here to Jayapura with plans to begin a new
life in Irian Jaya.

The Boeings are a major transportation improvement in the
government's program to resettle people from overcrowded Java to
the lesser densely populated islands, Antara reported.

In the past, settlers and their belongings were transported
and crammed into Hercules planes. Now with the use of passenger
jets they travel in style.

Ajum, a 50-year old woman who was traveling with her husband
and four children, was elated. "I feel as if we are on holiday,"
she said before boarding the plane.

Wibowo, director general for the deployment and supervision at
the Ministry of Transmigration, said at the airport that the new
method was not necessarily more expensive.

"The use of passenger jets is in fact more efficient because
it takes only five hours to reach Jayapura, while a Hercules
plane would take at least seven and half hours," he said.

He added that the government is paying an hourly rate to PT
Bali Air, the owners of the Boeing 737 planes. The private
operator has won a contract to transport 225 families from
Jakarta, Surabaya and Solo to Irian Jaya.

"We hope the jet planes will encourage more people to join the
transmigration program," he said.

The Ministry of Transmigration previously chartered the
Hercules and Transhall propeller planes from the state-owned PT
Pelita Air Service when transporting transmigrants.

A source in Pelita said that the airline did not extend the
contract with the Ministry of Transmigration because its Hercules
planes had been claimed by the Air Force. (rms)