BRR Disbursement Sluggish
Tuesday, 25 April, 2006 | 18:10 WIB

TEMPO Interactive, Jakarta: The post-tsunami rehabilitation and reconstruction process in Aceh and Nias has been sluggish.

Mulia Nasution, Director General of the State Treasury at the Finance Department, said up to the end of March this year, only three percent of the budget for Aceh-Nias rehabilitation and reconstruction had been disbursed.

Mulia revealed that the total budget allocated for the Aceh-Nias rehabilitation and reconstruction process, both through ministries and the Reconstruction and Rehabilitation Agency (BRR), amounted to a total of Rp13.685 trillion.

Of this amount, so far only Rp452 billion (three percent) has been realized by the central government.

“Realization is still small because (there have been no requests for) fund disbursement (by the rehabilitation and reconstruction units),“ she said yesterday.

However, Mulia went on to say there had not been any obstacles at the directorate general as regards disbursement of rehabilitation and reconstruction funds.

“Perhaps the projects have already been completed. What is left is preparation of the necessary documentation (for disbursements),” she said.

Kuntoro Mangkusubroto, BRR Head, denied that there were obstacles in the rehabilitation and reconstruction process with the result that it seemed sluggish.

“What month is it now? This is just the beginning. How could all of the money have been disbursed yet?” he said.

In addition, said Kuntoro, BRR acknowledged that it had to follow tender process procedures which take a minimum of 52 days per project auction.

This is to cover the announcement process, the appointment of partners, placing of bids by participants, and checking, totaling 52 days.

BRR, said Kuntoro, chose to act carefully and follow procedures rather than making mistakes that could result in misconduct such as corruption.

Agus Supriyanto