Blowing away Ambition by renegade 150
Note: Italics added for emphasis.
Children’s Day turns sour in Jakarta
Fri, Jul 25, 2008
Jakarta Post /ANN
ACOMMEMORATION of Indonesia’s National Children’s Day turned sour on Wednesday, when the government refused to allow children to publicly read out their demand for a special ministry of their own.
The request was the last point of a six-point declaration drafted during the recent 7th Indonesian Children’s Congress in Bogor, West Java.
Children aged between 12 and 18 had taken part in the event organised by the Social Services Ministry.
The restriction, which the children took to be a denial of freedom of expression, took place right under the nose of President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, who was at the park in East Jakarta, along with dignitaries and 15,000 children.
It is unclear if the President knew about the censorship.
The children’s representatives said the event organisers had forbidden them from making the demand for “political reasons”.
“We feel hurt by the restriction. The declaration is just an expression of our ideas, so we should have been allowed to speak out,” said Ajat Sudrajat, who had signed the declaration.
“We don’t care if the ministry can be established only in the next 10 years or so. We just want to be heard.”
Other points in the declaration, “Voice of Indonesian Children”, included the aspiration to be creative and intelligent children, protected from violence or exploitation, and a desire to be protected from “the dangers of tobacco in order to grow and develop as naturally as possible”.
Social Services Minister Bachtiar Chamsyah defended the restriction.
“I explained to (the children) the condition of our country. It is impossible for the government to set up the ministry because it would increase the burden on the state budget.
“Maybe we can make it come true only within the next 20 years, when our country’s economy has improved.”
It is unclear why this meant the children could not declare their wish.
Mr Bachtiar also asked the children to stop demanding their own rights.
National Commission for Child Protection secretary-general Arist Merdeka Sirait said the restriction showed the government’s lack of commitment to addressing the problems Indonesian children face.
“We urgently need a ministry that deals with children’s affairs, as the government has failed to address their problems, such as violence and child labour,” he said.
The commission estimated that 6.5 million children in the country were forced to quit school last year in order to work. …> go to article
OECD urges anti-poverty reform on Jakarta
By Lisa Murray in Jakarta Published: July 24 2008
Indonesia needs to overhaul its labour laws and remove foreign ownership restrictions to help raise economic growth to levels that would have an impact on poverty, Angel Gurría, head of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, said on Thursday.
Mr Gurría was in Jakarta to release the OECD’s first comprehensive study of the Indonesian economy. Its report recommended Indonesia introduce a mechanism linking increases in local fuel prices to world energy markets, with a view to obviating politically motivated adjustments and eventually wiping out all subsidies.
In spite of a 30 per cent rise in fuel prices in May, Indonesia’s government is still expected to spend a quarter of its budget, about $30bn, on fuel and electricity subsidies this year.
“It’s just a huge amount,” Mr Gurría said in an interview with the Financial Times. “We think we’re making a contribution by coming and saying: ‘For heaven’s sake, do you realise what you could do with this money?’ ”
The OECD expects Indonesia’s economy to grow by more than 6 per cent this year but says it needs to boost that rate to about 8 per cent to reduce poverty and unemployment. The organisation advised the central bank to act “resolutely” and “pre-emptively” to stave off inflation, which hit a 21-month high of more than 11 per cent in June.
Boediono, the central bank governor appointed in May, said this week he believed inflation had peaked but the bank would use gradual rate increases to keep it under control.
The OECD said Indonesia should review its labour laws because complicated dismissal procedures and hefty severance and long-service leave payments discouraged companies from investing and hiring. It also recommended reducing the minimum wage, which, at about 65 per cent of median pay, was “too high” and “out of step with productivity gains”. Rather than protecting workers, the high minimum wage forced people into the informal sector, where there was little regulation and poor pay, it said.
Asked whether the government would follow up the recommendations, Mahendra Siregar from the Co-ordinating Ministry for the Economy said only that it would “study them further”. “Whether our particular policy formation requires further engagement or discussion with the OECD, we will inform them later,” he said.
Mr Gurría conceded that labour reform and changes to fuel price subsidies were difficult to introduce nine months from an election.
The OECD is looking to develop what it terms an “enhanced engagement” with Indonesia as a first step towards full membership. The same approach is being taken with Brazil, China, India and South Africa. …> go to article
INDONESIA: Poverty at root of commercial sex work
Photo: A. Mirza/ILO
JAKARTA, 24 July 2008 (IRIN) – In a district of the northeastern part of West Java, commercial sex workers are touting for business right outside the mosque. Bandungwangi, a local NGO working against trafficking, says half the women and children it rescues from prostitution in Jakarta come from this district.
“The root of the problem is poverty, but in some areas – like that district [child protection agencies have asked that its name not be revealed] in West Java – prostitution is accepted. It’s the culture,” explains Arum Ratnawati of the International Labour Organization’s (ILO) International Programme on the Elimination of Child Labour, with people so poor they are forced to sell or send their children into commercial sex work to earn income for the family.” …>go to article
INDONESIA: Child malnutrition aggravated by food, oil price rises
JAKARTA, 21 July 2008 (IRIN) – Thirteen toddlers are fighting for their lives in Ba’a hospital in a remote village in Nusa Tenggara Province, eastern Indonesia. All of them are suffering from malnutrition. “They are very weak – only skin and bones and swollen stomachs,” Dr Rina Sudjiawati told IRIN. “Because of their condition they are very vulnerable to other serious illnesses.”Dozens of Indonesian children under five died of malnutrition in the first six months of 2008, according to the health authorities, although no accurate figure can be determined.
The World Food Programme (WFP) estimates 13 million children in Indonesia suffer from malnutrition. In some Indonesian districts about 50 percent of infants and young children are underweight.
“Some parts of this country have even worse data than sub-Saharan Africa,” said Anne Vincent, head of the UN Children’s Fund’s (UNICEF’s) health and nutrition section in Indonesia. Vincent is “appalled” by eating habits in Indonesia. “Sometimes they give their children only rice with water. Kids don’t grow on that.” …> go to article
