Jakarta/Sidoarjo – House of Representatives Deputy Speaker Soetardjo Soerdjogoeritno was criticized Wednesday by fellow lawmakers for reversing a decision to question the government on the mudflow in Sidoarjo, East Java.
During a plenary session of the House on Tuesday, presided over by Soetardjo, lawmakers decided to knock back a report from a House special team, which concluded the mudflow was a natural phenomenon, not man-made.
During the session, lawmakers criticized the report, which they said sided with Lapindo Brantas Inc., the company widely blamed for the disaster.
Soetardjo then offered the session two options – to continue the team's work or to move forward with plans to question the government about its response to the mudflow and its treatment of victims.
The majority of lawmakers chose to question the government, at which point Soetardjo ended the session, with a decision to summon the government over the disaster.
To the surprise of lawmakers who attended Tuesday's session, Soetardjo, 74, said Wednesday the House's special mudflow team would continue its work on its report.
"What I decided was to prolong the mudflow special team's work and, if we want to", we can question the government later, said the House deputy speaker, who also heads the mudflow team. Soetardjo's about-face was slammed by fellow legislators who want to question the government about the disaster.
"What was decided in the plenary session cannot be changed just by a statement outside the meeting," said Djoko Susilo of the National Mandate Party (PAN).
He said the plenary session clearly agreed to reject the team's report and question the government over the disaster. "We can listen to recordings of the plenary session as evidence," he said.
Djoko said a plenary session was the highest forum in the House and that decisions made during the sessions could only be changed through another plenary meeting. He said the PAN faction would discuss the issue Friday.
Ida Fauziah, a legislator with the National Awakening Party (PKB), said she did not understand what Soetardjo meant when he said they could "prolong the team's work" and question the government later.
She said a plenary session that discussed the issue of Lapindo last year decided the House would formally question the government if its special mudflow team failed to complete its report to the satisfaction of lawmakers. "We should refer to that decision," said Ida.
Commenting on the report, volcanologist Surono said the Sidoarjo mudflow would not have occurred without a "trigger". "Sidoarjo is indeed a mud volcano source. But if it was not fiddled around with, it would not have been a disaster like this," he said during a seminar at the Surabaya Institute of Technology in East Java.
Surono, who has conducted research on a mud volcano at Surabaya's Juanda Airport, said there was only a small-scale mud volcano in Sidoarjo. He said that based on its natural characteristics, the mud volcano would have remained small without some sort of trigger.
Meanwhile, some 300 victims of the mudflow from five affected villages in Sidoarjo, continued their protest Wednesday. The protesters demanded Lapindo complete its compensation payments to those affected by the disaster, and urged the government to include several more villages in the map of affected areas.
Protester Luthfi Abdillah said representatives of affected villages were in Jakarta to meet ministers and make sure their demands were heard. (alf).
[ID Nugroho contributed to this story from Sidoarjo.]