Ridwan Max Sijabat, Jakarta – Despite public criticism of their overseas trips, dozens of lawmakers will again go abroad – this time to South Korea and Hong Kong – for what they called "comparative studies".
The trips, aimed at gathering information from the two countries on how to fight bird flu and deal with labor issues, will cost the state some Rp 500 million (US$54,700). They will involve 30 lawmakers from the House labor and health commission. They are slated to leave on Wednesday.
"The first group of 15 legislators is scheduled to depart on Nov. 29 to meet relevant authorities in Hong Kong and pay a visit to a UN laboratory to seek explanatory information on how the former British colony succeeded in stopping the bird flu that killed almost one million people in 1968," commission deputy chairman Max Sopacua said Monday.
He said the legislators will stay in Hong Kong for three days, spending some Rp 250 million from the commission's 2006 budget.
The second 15-member group of lawmakers will fly to South Korea to observe the implementation of an agreement on recruitment of Indonesian workers employed in small- and medium-scale companies there.
Max said the lawmakers are allowed to bring their wives at their own cost. He defended the planned foreign visits as part of a long-term program, saying the trips were already approved by the House leadership and the House's secretariat general.
The House has drawn fire from the public for sending many of its members overseas for so-called comparative studies. Critics questioned the effectiveness of the trips and said they reflected the House's lack of a sense of urgency about the country's economic difficulties.
Dozens of members of the House transportation commission drew criticism earlier when they visited the Netherlands, France and Germany while deliberating the transportation bill.
Members of the same commission are scheduled to leave for Japan and South Korea next month.
Earlier, the tourism commission did a short study of tourism development and gambling site management in Egypt, while the defense commission made two trips to Iran, Turkey and other Middle Eastern countries. The two commissions' foreign visits cost more than Rp 2 billion from the House's 2006 budget.
The Forum of Citizens Concerned About the Indonesian Legislature (Formappi) blasted the House's foreign visits, saying they wasted state money and worsened the House's already tarnished image.
"The labor and health commission could just download comprehensive information from the Internet on how Hong Kong handled the 1968 bird flu pandemic and its labor regulations to protect foreign workers, and how South Korea has implemented the bilateral agreement on the recruitment of Indonesian workers," forum coordinator Sebastian Salang said.
Despite the foreign studies, almost all the bills involved sparked public protests after the House passed them, he said. The laws criticized included those on ground water, on labor and on the protection of migrant workers, he added.