President Joko Widodo of Indonesia appears at last to have won the battle against his bureaucracy that had prevented any and all external sources to know of the root cause of the forest fires in Sumatra and Kalimantan. Thanks to the efforts of the Singapore government to bring to book all those companies and business products related to the annual forest fires, the Jakarta bureaucrats have at last shown some love for the millions of trees and the people who have suffered as a consequence of the greed of profit makers in Jakarta. I am sure much fauna and flora too have been decimated, and they may have been wiped from the face of the earth forever.
In the fledgling democracy that Indonesia is, Jakarta’s rulers working in tandem with business corporations have no love for Sumatra and Kalimantan. As the regions are far away, none of the destruction would have come to the attention of the world if not for the haze from the forest fires blanketing Singapore and Kuala Lumpur. Nobody in Jakarta worries about the people, flora and fauna of the regions outside Jakarta. Only a volcanic eruption in Java that blankets Jakarta for months will teach them the value of loving the environment above profit making.
It is ludicrous that the Indonesian Cabinet Secretary Pramano Anung can even argue that they were concerned of Singapore getting the name if allowed to assist. It is akin to the statement by another Jakarta leader that people should be grateful to the good air that they enjoy from Indonesia for eleven months. One has to wonder where these thinkers come from. Do they not love the people, flora and fauna as part of Indonesia? Is it so important to calibrate credit for them while their people, flora, and fauna and neighboring countries suffer? It is a contorted nationalism coming from frontline leaders. There is no love for their country.
Just as profits attracted these Jakarta leaders to burn the forests in the outer islands of Indonesia, it is the fear of losing profits that has made them invite Singapore, Malaysia, Russia, Austria and others. If not for concerted action by the Singapore government to punish the firms profiting from the burning of forests of Sumatra and Kalimantan, Jakarta’s bureaucrats would not have been forced to declare that they have a national disaster. The disaster was made by Jakarta’s bureaucrats in collusion with profit motivated corporations. Such punitive actions should be imposed by all countries together with sanctions from the United Nations and United states on Jakarta’s bureaucrats and the greedy companies. Only then the people of Sumatra, Kalimantan and many other islands in Indonesia can protect their flora, fauna and themselves.
Written by
Professor A Veeramani ( A Mani )
Singapore / Japan
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