Jokowi Urged to Seize PTTEP Assets over Timor Sea Oil Spill

TEMPO.CO, Kupang - Indonesian President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo is urged to confiscate the assets of PTT Exploration and Production Public Company Limited (PTTEP) worth US$3.5 billion, because it has denied liability for polluting the Timor Sea, East Nusa Tenggara (NTT), from the explosion of Montara oil rig in West Atlas Block Timor Sea on August 21, 2009.

“We also demand the government to cancel the [boundary] treaty in the Timor Sea in 1997, which has not been ratified,” the NTT Seaweed Farmers Advocacy Team chairman Ferdi Tanoni told Tempo, Monday, August 22, 2016.

They have made the demands since the issue of Timor Sea pollution has yet to be addressed after seven years. The PTTEP has denied liability in the marine pollution, prompting NTT residents to file a class action against PTTEP in the Federal Court of Australia in Darwin.

Timor sea oil spill has affected fishermen in NTT. “Before the pollution, our earnings in the Timor Sea could reach Rp20 million, we can only get Rp5 million now,” said Timor Sea Traditional Fishermen Alliance (Antralamor) chairman Mustafa.

Consequently, he went on, some fishermen had to change occupation into logging. Those who are still fishermen have been fishing not in the Timor Sea, but in Kalimantan. “I’ve also changed my occupation and become a logger,” he said.

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