VP Kalla Tells Business Owners to Behave

Jakarta Globe, Novianti Setuningsih, Dec 08, 2014

Vice President Jusuf Kalla, left, talking with Trade Minister Rachmet Gobel at
 the leadership meeting of the Indonesian Chamber of Commerce and Industry
(Kadin) on Monday. (Antara Photo/Muhammad Adimaja)

Jakarta. Vice President Jusuf Kalla in a speech for the Indonesian Chamber of Commerce and Industry (Kadin) on Monday urged the nation’s entrepreneurs to stop ruining the environment and pay their taxes.

“In the wood-trading era, in the 1960s and 70s, a lot of trees were cut down, causing floods that we still have to deal with until now,” said Kalla, himself a successful businessman.

The vice president also told the hundreds of entrepreneurs attending Kadin’s national leadership meeting that the government was going to improve its natural resources management.

“The mining sector was profiting while our environment was wasted. The [new] regulation is made to protect our natural resources,” Kalla said.

He added that business should also pay all taxes and royalties they owe, and that owners could be banned from traveling abroad if they fail to do so.

Kalla explained that the government needed the income from taxes and royalties to help fund its program to improve the nation’s infrastructure.

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