Andi Hajramuni, The Jakarta Post, Makassar | Tue, 12/08/2009 4:10 PM
President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono has canceled a planned visit Wednesday to Makassar to open the 52nd Nusantara Day in the South Sulawesi capital, and will instead send Coordinating Economic Minister Hatta Radjasa to represent him.
Fisheries and Maritime Affairs Ministry data center head Soenan H. Poernomo said Tuesday at a press conference in Makassar that Yudhoyono was already penciled in for another engagement elsewhere.
“We were informed of the cancellation two days ago. The President has another appointment,” Soenan said.
He dismissed speculation Yudhoyono was staying in Jakarta due to security concerns over a mass rally planned for Dec. 9 to commemorate International Anticorruption Day.
“It’s not because of the rally at all, but there’s another event the President has to attend,” Soenan said.
The cancellation has forced Nusantara Day organizers to call off a planned dialogue between the President and about 3,000 fishermen from the country’s 33 provinces.
Soenan said the commemoration of Nusantara Day on Wednesday would mark a move to develop the maritime paradigm that an archipelagic country like Indonesia required to promote its maritime and fishery sectors.
Despite the country’s rich fishing and maritime resources, fishermen remain among the poorest and least developed of the population.
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