Kediri – Protest actions against the government’s planned fuel price hikes continued in a number of cities around the country. Demonstrations by housewives, pedicab drivers, vegetable vendors, the urban poor and students took place in Makassar, Kediri, Yogyakarta, Semarang, Bandung and Sukabumi on Friday May 9.

Scores of residents in the East Java city of Kediri held a protest action near the Brantas River bridge in Pocanan yesterday morning. The majority of protesters were petty traders, youth and pedicab drivers (becak) several of whom parked their pedicabs on the side of the bridge spanning the Brantas River that cuts through the centre of Kediri city. The housewives of vegetable street vendors also stopped trading for several hours to take part in the action opposing the fuel price hikes.

The demonstrators demanded that the government revaluate the planned increases saying they hoped that it would choose another option. They also called on the Kediri Regional House of Representatives (DPRD) not to remain silent on the issue.

One of the pedicab drivers, Ayub, said that he will no longer be able to provide for his family if the government increases the price of fuel. Murniati, a trader at the Bandar Market said that the prices of basic commodities are already going up even though the fuel price rise has not happened yet.

In the South Sulawesi provincial capital of Makassar meanwhile, around 100 housewives demonstrated at the South Sulawesi DPRD voicing their opposition to the planned hikes. The protesters, who had walked from the Indonesia Muslim University campus to the DPRD, brought dozens of banners and poster with message opposing the price increases and handed out leaflets in the name of the Makassar branch of the Indonesian Poor People’s Union (SRMI).

SRMI chairperson Wahidabaharuddin Upa said that cutting fuel subsidies was not the only way to overcome the state’s financial problems. SRMI is proposing instead that the government nationalise foreign oil and gas companies and place a moratorium on the payment of the foreign debt until the people’s welfare has improved saying that this would be a better way to resolve the problem.

Pots and pans

Around 100 urban poor in the city of Sukabumi in West Java from the United Poor People’s Forum (FRMB) also held a protest action at the Sukabumi city hall. The protesters, who were dominated by housewives, brought household utensils such as pots, pans and jerry cans as a symbolic protest against the price hikes.

One of the demonstrators, Ny Ai, said that the price of basic commodities is already out of the reach of the poor. “If the price of fuel goes up, the price of food will most certainly rise even higher”, she said.

Students also held protests against the planned price increases in the Central Java cities of Yogyakarta and Semarang and the West Java provincial capital of Bandung. In Yogyakarta, joint actions were held to coincide with the arrival of a number of government officials including Vice President Jusuf Kalla, who was attending the marriage of one of Sultan Hamengku Buwono X’s children. (NIK/ROW/AHA/A03/WER/A15/LAS)

[Slightly abridged translation by James Balowski.]