KATADATA – A total of 38 oil and gas (oil and gas) and mineral and coal (minerba) mining companies are considered not transparent. These companies have not submitted payment data to complete the 2012-2013 EITI (Extractive Industry Transparency Initiative) report.

There are 11 companies out of a total of 174 oil and gas companies that have not submitted the data. Meanwhile, in the mineral and coal sector, there are 27 companies out of a total of 108 companies in the country.

EITI is an international standard in reporting state revenues from extractive industries, the process of which involves many consisting of government, business, and civil society and has been implemented in 46 countries. The implementation of EITI in Indonesia is based on Presidential Regulation No. 26/2010 concerning Transparency of State Revenues and Regional Revenues Obtained from Extractive Industries.

This is what makes EITI Indonesia’s membership status suspended. This suspended status has been in effect since February 26, 2015 because Indonesia was late in issuing the EITI report for the 2012-2013 period.

Representative of Civil Society in the Indonesian EITI Implementation Team Yenni Soetjipto urged the government to be firm. According to him, the company’s reluctance to report on EITI should be a tool for evaluating the government’s existence of these companies.

The implementation of EITI Indonesia is mandated by Presidential Instruction (Inpres) Number 7 of 2015 concerning Action to Prevent and Eradicate Corruption. This means, he said, the reluctance of companies to report EITI could be interpreted as resistance to efforts by the anti-corruption movement.

Yenni hopes that these companies can send reports no later than 5 October. “If possible, we hope that there will be sanctions for not reporting such as the announcement to the mass media and the report will be followed up to the Minister and the relevant local governments,” he said.

Coordinator of Publish What You Pay (PWYP) Indonesia Maryati Abdullah said 38 companies have the potential to set a bad precedent for transparency and governance of the extractive industry in Indonesia. Even though the government is trying to restore the suspended EITI Indonesia membership status.

“This shows the weak commitment and seriousness of these companies to be transparent and at the same time does not support the Jokowi administration’s efforts to improve transparency and accountability for the extractive industries in Indonesia,” he said in his press statement, Tuesday (29/9).

Source: 38 Oil and Gas and Mineral and Coal Companies Are Deemed Not Transparent