ABANDON LOGIC. GO PERSONAL

Dealing with Indonesian bureaucracy? Tip: Don’t think like a Westerner

This is a true tale.  It’s minor and personal, more anecdote than saga.  It won’t rock Canberra or Jakarta.  It discloses nothing careworn veterans of trans-national trade negotiations don’t know, but it will daze newcomers.

Here’s the scene.  It’s the end of the fasting month and almost the start of the Idul Fitri holiday.  People are hungry and grumpy.

We should be in Australia.  We bought tickets home when Covid-19 was a foreign infection set to by-pass Indonesia because its citizens are holy.  So said the Health Minister who’s also a doctor.  He prescribed prayer. The President recommended drinking jamu – traditional herb medicine.

The plague ignored both men’s advice and swept into the archipelago.  Flights were cancelled and we were stranded.

Hardships are few but there’s one essential – prescribed blood pressure medication.  In Australia a 30-pill pack costs $15 – in Indonesia $60 and the brand different.  So is the formulation and the drug hard to find.

So I got a renewal prescription for six month’s supply dispensed in Australia and posted on 5 May.  

I won’t be specific about our city in case the guilty get fingered. The package arrived on 20 May and with it a demand for a 25 per cent tariff.  We mustered these entirely logical and sensible arguments for an appeal:

·        The  Indonesia-Australia Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement is a ratified free trade agreement so no tariff.

·        The meds are for personal use and not resale.

·        They’re an essential health item.  I don’t want them – I need them.

·        The meds were prescribed by a doctor and a copy of the script included along with receipts, customs declaration, ID cards and other docs.

·        When we fly into Indonesia carrying meds they’re declared and no tariff levied.

The dispute ran for more than an hour and involved four uniformed officials. They scrutinised the paperwork, heard the arguments but remained unmoved. These are the regulations – read them yourself.  This is the law.  Pay or leave empty-handed.   Things were getting heated.

Then the customs guy asked my wife’s religion.  She exploded -  what had this to do with the issue?  He’d noticed a document showed her birthplace as Makassar – an intensely Islamic city where the residents have a reputation for ferocity.

Suddenly the tension vanished.  He too was from the South Sulawesi capital – how about that?  They exchanged parochial jokes and a bit of local lingo.  Much laughter.

My wife collected the package and paid nothing.  

The moral of this story for Australians confronting Indonesian bureaucrats?  Forget Western rational argument and wads of paperwork.  Just ensure your rep comes from the same city as the government official and maybe the same religion.

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