Jakarta – Thousands of students took to the streets across Indonesia on Wednesday to protest the government's plan to raise fuel prices.

With global oil prices surging, President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono has said he has little choice but to slash subsidies that threaten to bust the state budget, and raise fuel prices by up to 30 percent by the month's end.

But dissatisfaction with the plan has mounted in this nation of 235 million where tens of millions live in abject poverty and rely on government subsidies to make fuel products affordable.

"We reject the planned fuel hike," student and protest organizer Rudi Daman said Wednesday at a rally of hundreds of people outside the presidential palace in the capital, Jakarta.

He said the poor would be the ones who suffer most from the plan. "It will trigger a rise in the cost of staple foods," public transportation and electricity, he said.

Similar rallies were held in cities across the sprawling archipelago, from Sumatra island in the west to Sulawesi in the east. Some students occupied the local council building in West Sumatra's capital of Padang. In nearby Jambi, demonstrators briefly took down a national flag at the governor's office.

Many also used the public demonstrations to mark the 10-year anniversary of former dictator Suharto's fall from power after 32-years of rule.