Reinforcing Resource Nationalism

By Colin Singer

The Jakarta Post recently published an article titled, ‘Cutting the legs of the Indonesian oil industry’, by Yvonne Chen. This article goes some way to explaining why resource nationalism has become such a ‘hot topic’, as such elitist outlooks stoke a backlash against the ongoing logic of resource exploitation and mismanagement. The writer, a policy advisor at the American Chamber of Commerce decries the new regulations for skilled expatriate workers which includes ruling out over fifty year olds and requiring Indonesian language competency. Members of the American Chamber have produced oil in Indonesia for several decades. But during this time they have been unable to train and source personnel to have the competence of expatriate 55 year olds?

Perhaps it has nothing to do with the skill sets of the local indigenous workforce, who are in such demand from Saudi through to Malaysia, Qatar, and throughout Africa, that there is now a shortage of qualified oil field personnel within Indonesia. Or maybe another game is at play, wherein wage injustices are slowly being equalised. The 55 year old expatriate earns in one day’s basic salary or consultancy fees more than that which their American employers are willing to pay Indonesian staff for one to three months labour. This does not include their additional overheads such as housing, and subsequent housing departments to source/maintain foreign employees, transport and transport departments, children’s education and ensuing departments again.

These local and international ‘overheads’ are excessive, but the final black eye is that through ‘cost recovery’ the Indonesian taxpayer gets to pick up the majority of these costs. The disproportionate incentives for expatriates mean companies have little pressure to expend costs to train and hire locals. For the billions that foreign national companies have made and continue to make out of Indonesian resources, they have put only the slightest return into apposite local education and training facilities.

Resource nationalists believe that foreign owned oil companies and mineral extractors see Indonesia only through the prism of extractable resources, where local labour is something to live with but not a priority for development if it inhibits the current arrangement of expatriate gravy trains. They don’t buy into the constructions of corporate responsibility that subject Indonesians to representations of economically equal cooperation between locals and ‘nationals’ in the process of  sharing in Indonesia’s resource wealth. More and more resent it.

If Ms Chen wishes us to feel pity about the hardly stringent Indonesian visa requirements, perhaps she should be aware that Indonesians wanting to visit Australia, America, or the UK are subjected to a far stricter degree of assessment and burden of proof to substantiate character, medical status, and financial competence. There are endless requirements that have a prohibitive effect on Indonesians wishing to travel let alone work in those countries. Indonesians, like other nationals from developing countries, require medical tests, a specific amount of money in the bank, English language competency, and letters of recommendation as par course. Having successfully acquired a visa, they must tolerate a professionally hostile encounter with customs and immigrations who are looking out for a potential influx of plane people from Indonesia, or more alarmingly, one of Indonesia’s notorious smiling terrorists.

In the few years remaining before Indonesia’s natural resources become unprofitable and unproductive, is it not fair to ask that Indonesians themselves be given the opportunity to benefit?

Colin is the Social and Political Director at the Indonesia Institute and a former advisor to BPMIGAS.