Last Wednesday, my beloved Honda car did not want to take me to work. It simply didn't want to start. I tried several times but to no avail. Maybe the ghost who's been frightening my wife the past few nights played a trick on me.
As my wife nervously waited nearby, I practiced my fine mechanical skills: opening the hood, testing the Yuasa battery. The battery still worked, leaving me without a clue what to check next. As a last resort, I called a nearby Honda service center where I'm a member, and thus entitled to a house call or free towing. I told the person at the other end of the line my problem.
"Could you start the car again please?" he asked.
"I said the car does not want to start!" I replied, explaining the details.
"I want to hear the sound of its attempt to start to determine the cause."
Then I complied.
"Ok, enough. It's because the fuel pump doesn't work, Pak," he said. "We'll send you a towing car."
Wow, I was impressed. How did he know so fast that the problem lied with the fuel pump. Then, I remembered a story about a taxi company, Gamya Taksi, which was leaving Pertamina to court Shell after 270 units or one-fourth of its fleet could not operate due to broken fuel pumps. It is not alone - Blue Bird and Express taxi groups have also been affected, with over 1,400 and 1,000 broken pumps respectively.
Gamya's preliminary investigation found that Pertamina's premium fuel bought from gas stations in Kreo, Pondok Bambu and on Jl. TB Simatupang contained sulfur, which damaged the fuel pumps. Replacing the fuel pumps only was not a solution. Gamya is now considering Shell.
As expected, Pertamina has denied vehemently that its gasoline was the problem. It said it conducted sampling tests at a number of gas stations, and the result was the gasoline met all the test requirements.
If Pertamina refuses to be held responsible, who else then? Maybe, it's the work of the ghost in my house or the evil spirits sent by Gamya's closest competitor. Gamya claims to have lost up to Rp 162 million (US$18,000) in revenue per day due to the damage. As of last Tuesday, 50 Gamya taxis could not operate due to limited stock of fuel pump components.
I was the next victim. Arriving at the Honda workshop, the polite customer service officer told me the workshop ran out of the much-sought-after fuel pumps and therefore my car would not be ready until the next day. Okay, no problem.
"How much are fuel pumps, anyway?" I asked.
"About Rp 2 million *US$200*," he said flatly as if Rp 2 million was a nice amount of money I might like to donate to Pertamina.
"I'd also suggest Bapak change your car's fuel from premium to Pertamax or Shell or Petronas products. This problem, I suspect, won't end soon."
I wondered if this was how Pertamina or the government - or maybe the evil spirits - had forced people like me to shift from consuming subsidized premium to non-subsidized fuels. If so, this is in fact a brilliant idea after initial plans - rationing, smart cards and exclusion of certain vehicles - fail. But, nonetheless, it's cruel. Frankly, I don't deserve the subsidy, so I accept the suggestion to abandon subsidized fuel, but the Rp 2 million is just criminal.
Worse, this tactic becomes indiscriminate. Gamya Taxis, an operator I love with its good service and "lower tariffs", cannot maintain its competitive tariffs if it must consume non-subsidized fuels. In the end, taxi customers will suffer.
This negligent fuel contamination, if it's true, shows a bigger, deeper problem in our government and society: regularly using inhumane short-cuts to achieve goals. I bet many of us have heard plenty of stories about fires at slum areas or markets. Rumors have it that many of those places are deliberately burned to make way for developments.
My wife then gave me consolation. "You came out lucky. You only lost Rp 2 million. Those people in slums and markets lost their homes, kiosks and even their livelihoods."
- Riyadi Suparno
