State-Owned Enterprises Minister Dahlan Iskan said Saturday that producing electric vehicles could be a solution to problems triggered by increasing fuel prices.
“Let’s have a war against fuel. There are no alternatives, [the increasing prices] are inevitable,” Dahlan told an audience of 500 students of the Bandung Institute of Technology (ITB).
“We also have to take measures in order to help people who will be affected by the rising fuel prices,” he said as quoted by tempo.co.
Dahlan admitted that the plan to increase fuel prices had put the government under nation-wide pressure, even when fuel subsidies had reached Rp 200 trillion (US$ 21.79 billion).
“That is a big amount for subsidizing vehicle owners – and it is unfair. All that money can be spent on building infrastructure and other things that can be useful to the public,” Dahlan said.
Starting at 2:00 p.m., Dahlan spent more than an hour as a speaker in ITB’s west hall, discussing the idea of turning state-owned enterprises into international-class companies.
During the speech, he said that should we produce electric vehicles, they had to be locally assembled.
“I want it to be our national vehicle. It’s something that doesn’t use fuel. As long as there is no effort to cut down on fuel consumption, fuel-related problems will continue to be an issue,” Dahlan said.
Dahlan said that producing electric vehicles was crucial, considering the ever-increasing demand for private cars in Indonesia.
“The world is going in a direction where it will replace fossil fuel power with electric power. It will happen eventually. The world is headed that way,” he said.
