Minister Asks Reduction in Dividends For State Budget

Jakarta, Sept 10 (Antara) - Minister of State-owned Enterprises (SOE) Dahlan Iskan has asked the government to reduce SOE`s dividends that would be contributed to the 2014 state budget from Rp37 trillion to Rp32.4 trillion. "We ask the government to reduce state-owned firms` dividends that would be contributed to the state budget," the minister told the House of Representatives` Commission VI on financial affairs in a hearing here on Monday. He said the prices of several commodities in the world market were declining while the rupiah was depreciating against the US dollar. In the draft 2014 state budget, the government fixed state-owned firms` contribution from SOE dividends at Rp37 trillion. Some Rp5.9 trillion of the dividends will come from state-owned banks and the remaining Rp31.1 trillion came from other SOEs. He said that the gloom of the global economy next year was reflected in the downward revision of the World Bank and the IMF growth targets for 2014. "Commodities` prices of plantation and mining SOEs dropped to lower than the expected limit and will affect the performance of budget estimate," the minister said. He said that the dividends` pay out ratio (POR) of telecommunication firm PT Telkom had declined and so had the profit of mining firms. This caused the decline of other SOEs contribution by 16 percent to the state budget in 2013. Based on projection of state-firms` shareholders, the portion of dividends belonging to the government in 2013 was predicted at Rp32.4 trillion, or Rp1 trillion lower than the projection in 2012 which stood at Rp33.42 trillion.