PT WIKA TO BUILD BRIDGES IN ALGERIA

Jakarta, Jan 13 (ANTARA) - An Indonesian construction company PT Wijaya Karya (Wika) Tbk will build five bridges in Algeria worth Rp400 billion, which will be finished within 1.5 years.

"Right now we are just seeking support from Bank Indonesia to get a banking reference in Algeria," the company's president director, Bintang Perbowo, said here on Tuesday.
He made the statement after accompanying Algeria's minister of public works Amar Ghoul in his visit to a pre-cast concrete plant in Gunung Putri, Bogor, West Java, belonging to PT Wika Beton which is a PT Wika subsidiary.
Bintang told reporters Bank Indonesia's support was badly needed because Indonesia still had no branch in that country which could serve as a correspondent bank while the project was being carried out.
Earlier along with Kajima Taisei of Japan, Wika developed an East West Motorway toll road linking Morocco and East Algeria. PT Wika's package covering 104 kilometers of the total 1,200 kilometers long road was worth Rp415.6 billion.
Bintang said the road project was started in 2007 and was expected to be completed in 2010. He said PT Wika's project has absorbed 1,000 workers from managerial staff to field workers and 300 more workers would be added soon.
He said to reduce work Wika has exported the pre-cast concrete plant to Algeria at a value of Rp78 billion including the operators who all came from Indonesia.
During his visit to the country, minister Ghoul had offered a number of big projects for PT Wika or other Indonesian contractors, including a 30,000 kilometers road, an elevated road, fish and trading ports, airports and a one-million housing project.
The projects all cost up to US$180 billion consisting of infrastructure projects worth US$30 billion, railwayd worth US$30 billion, houses US$100 billion and other projects worth US$20 billion.
Minister Ghoul said to participate in Algerian projects companies need not take part in a tender but they could just cooperate with local partners.
The facility was given because of the close relationship between the two countries since colonialization period. Indonesia and Algeria immediately recognized their independence when the two declared it respectively from the Netherlands and France.