By Andi Abdussalam
Jakarta, Aug 27 (ANTARA)- Against the backdrop of mounting complaints at home and abroad over the perils of annual haze, Indonesian law enforcers are making arrests and quizzing plantation companies suspected to be responsible for forest fires in several parts of the country.
Police have arrested 20 people in Sumatra's Riau province and will quiz at least six plantation firms in Kalimantan over alleged roles in land and forest fires which have created haze and disturbed health, trade, land, sea and air transportations these past weeks.
The arrests were made about a week after President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono voiced his dissatisfaction over regional governments' inability to prevent and overcome forest fires in their respective provinces.
"We can still witness various fires in the last several weeks. We really regret their occurrence because all of these are related to the lack of responsibility, attention and leadership of the regional governments concerned," the President told Regional Representatives Council (DPD) at the parliament building last week.
The President had previously in June called on ministers concerned, provincial governors, district chiefs and mayors to jointly prevent and anticipate forest and land fires and to handle them whenever they occur.
In order to take follow up steps, the President summoned his relevant ministers to instruct legal sanction against plantation owners who used fires to clear forest areas for plantations. "Those who set forests on fire, mostly big plantation companies, must get legal sanction," Communications Minister Sofyan Djalil said quoting the Head of State.
Vice President Jusuf Kalla has also ordered police to take firm actions against those responsible for forest fires. "I have ordered the Riau Police chief to take stern actions and I have received reports that about 20 forest fire suspects in the province had been arrested," Kalla said.
The Vice President said police made the arrests on the suspects who included Indonesian businessmen and of a Malaysian plantation company.
In West Kalimantan, police will query executives of six plantation companies in whose operational areas hot spots have been detected.
The police would thus ask help from civil servant interrogators and the Environment Ministry to observe the location of the hot spots, West Kalimantan Police chief Brig Gen Nanan Soekarna was quoted as saying.
Nanan said the six plantation companies were located in Pontianak and Sambas districts. The civil servants interrogator team and the Environment Ministry officials would arrive here to conduct the inspection on Tuesday (Aug 29).
Law No. 23/1997 on environmental management stipulates a 10-year imprisonment and US$50,000-fine for people setting forests and land on fire for land clearing.
The law was enacted when the ASEAN region was plagued by the worst-ever haze crisis that cost it some 9.0 billion dollars due to air travel, tourism and other business disruptions in 1997-98.
Annual forest fires in Indonesia notably in Sumatra and Kalimantan always affect its neighboring countries as Malaysia, Singapore, Brunei Darussalam and Thailand.
At Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) talks held in Kuala Lumpur last week, Malaysian Trade Minister Rafidah Aziz said that Indonesia should take tough action to resolve the recurring issue.
The current measures by the Indonesian government, however, are not being taken because of overseas pressure only but also because of the perils suffered at home.
"The government was making the efforts not because of pressure from overseas but because of the interest of people at home," Vice President Jusuf Kalla said.
"It is not Kuala Lumpur alone which has complained. It was the people of Riau (Sumatra) and Pontianak (West Kalimantan) who have complained in the first place. Compared to the disturbance in Kuala Lumpur, the one in Pontianak has caused students to be unable to go to school," the Vice President said.
He was referring to the haze problem which has been taking place in the five provinces of Riau, Jambi, South Sumatra, Central Kalimantan and West Kalimantan.
In recent days, the forest fire-triggered haze has created health problems and delayed flights in Sumatra and Kalimantan.
Thick haze blanketed Jambi on Friday causing visibility to drop to between 200 and 250 meters. Motorists have to turn on their head lights in order to avoid collision as the haze was obstructing visibility.
The local health service reported that over the past week the number of people suffering from respiratory infection increased to about 10,000 people. People in Riau province have also suffered from respiratory infection.
Airport, river and sea transportation activities from and to Jambi during the past few days were also disturbed.
Even in West Kalimantan, visibility was down to less than the normal standard of 800 meters on Thursday, leading to the suspension of flights from and to the provincial capital Pontianak.
Two airplanes plying the Jakarta-Pontianak route aborted their flights when they were on their way to the capital of West Kalimantan after visibility in Supadio airport was down to 400 meters on Thursday. "With a visibility of only 400 meters, the life of passengers are at stake," officials said.
President Yudhoyono ordered Chief Welfare Minister Aburizal Bakrie to conduct cloud seeding and to drop water bombs in order to put out forest fires. For this purpose, the government has set aside Rp1 billion to Rp2 billion to finance the cloud seeding.
Hercules planes will be used to drop water bombs to the scenes of hotposts. "Each of the planes would carry about 8,000 liters of water to be dropped over the scene of forest fires," State Minister of Research and Technology Kusmayanto Kadiman said meanwhile.
(T.AO14/A/b003/B003). (T.SYS/A/A014/C/B003) 27-08-2006
Tidak ada komentar:
Posting Komentar