Walhi to decide on MPR seat next week

JAKARTA (JP): The Indonesian Environmental Forum (Walhi) is yet to decide whether or not to accept a seat in the People's Consultative Assembly (MPR) as one of the interest group representatives, who will play an important role in the coming presidential election.

"The members will decide whether or not to accept the MPR seat in a meeting next week," Nursyahbani Katjasungkana, a Walhi executive, said in a media briefing on Friday, referring to the forum's seventh congress planned for Aug. 22 to Aug. 27 in the South Kalimantan capital of Banjarmasin.

As an organization with a network of more than 400 NGOs, Walhi is eligible to send a representative to the MPR. The 700-member body has a total of 65 representatives from various interest groups including artists and scholars.

Nursyahbani said the upcoming meeting will also decide whether Walhi will remain a network of NGOs like it is now or transform itself into a mass-based organization.

She said that as a mass-based organization, Walhi would have more support from the common people and it would be easier for Walhi to mobilize people in addressing environmental issues.

Walhi will also elect a new leader in the meeting. Its current leader, Emmy Hafild, will contest for reelection along with other candidates including Arimbi Heroepoetri, Ramadhana Lubis, Bambang Widjayanto and Zohra A. Baso.

Arimbi Heroepoetri, currently deputy director of Walhi, said the government has shown little interest in overcoming environmental issues.

She said the government often adopts probusiness policies, which aggravate environmental degradation. She cited as examples the misappropriation of Rp 400 billion of forest rehabilitation funds for the national airplane maker IPTN and for the development of the failed one-million hectare peat-soil plantation in Central Kalimantan.

She said that what has happened so far is that the government has sold out the land and the natural resources to business interests, causing conflicts between capitalist interests and the people's interests.

Arimbi said people have a traditional wisdom of sustainable use of natural resources, while the government exploits the resources for profit and ignores the often disastrous environmental consequences.

Walhi wants to empower the people by nurturing a mass-based organization and developing its human resources, she said. (06)