KPKN denounces minister`s regulation on oil contractors` DMO


Jakarta, (Antara News) - An organizarion calling itself Committee to Save State Assets (KPKN) has denounced the issuance of a ministerial regulation on private oil and gas contractor companies` obligation to meet domestic need, saying the policy had the potential of causing the state to lose trillions of rupiah.

KPKN whose membership includes senior politician Amien Rais said Energy and Mineral Resources Minister`s Regulation No 2/2008 on the Implementation of the Obligation of Cooperation Contractors` Obligation to Meet Domestic Oil and Gas Needs was "just a way to legitimize the purpose of a letter from ExxonMobil on oil production-sharing relating to payment of a `domestic market obligation (DMO) fee.`"

"There is good reason to believe the ministerial regulation was issued to support the content of ExxonMobil`s letter on the DMO fee," another KPKN member, Marwan Batubara, said at a press conference here Monday.

Batubara who is a member of the Regional Representatives Council (DPD), said there also was a "strange thing" in the ExxoMobil letter which was supposed to be a pure business letter but had spaces for the signatures of the energy and mineral resources minister and the chief of the Upstream Oil and Gas Development Agency (BP Migas).

In the letter, he said, ExxonMobil asked that the DMO fee be payable only six months after its Cepu field in Central Java had reached peak production.

"With the postponement in the payment of the DMO fee, the government will receive a smaller revenue than before or suffer a loss of up to 80 million US dollars a year," he said.

Another KPKN member, Catur Saptudi, said the content of ExxonMobil`s letter would no doubt create a public uproar if it was publicized because it among other things said state-owned oil company Pertamina could not question whatever ExxonMobil did. "This will reveal a major national blunder, an act of delivering the country`s oil and reserves to a foreign interest," said Saptudi. a House of Representatives (DPR) member.

Meanwhile, Amien Rais, former chairman of the People`s Consultative Assembly (MPR), challenged the Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK) to investigate the corruption scandal that seemed to be behind the ExxonMobil letter and the issuance of the energy and mineral resources minister`s regulation.

"How is it possible that a minister issues a regulation that in effect revokes an arrangement that is more advantageous than what the regulation implies. We will wait for the KPK to step in," he said.(*)

Hmmmmmmm, there is something strange going on here!

strange? i don't think so. all looks par for the course. remember also, elections are coming up. banging the anti-foreigner nationalist can is a compulsory part of every political campaign.

... and the very fact that amien rais is involved should alert readers to the probability of rank opportunism.