"Do we want to go back to Japan`s era?"Jakarta (ANTARA News) - Former vice president M Jusuf Kalla believes that the plan to merge Indonesia`s three existing time zones into a single time zone is a mistake that could affect 200 million people in the country.
"It could create a chaos; there is no objective reason to unite the time zones in Indonesia," Kalla said here on Tuesday.
The conversion to the single zone of GMT+8 or the Central Indonesian Standard Time will force the 193 million residents of western Indonesia and six million residents of eastern Indonesia to change their life patterns drastically, he remarked.
For example, the residents of western Indonesia will be compelled to begin their activities one hour earlier.
Kalla noted that the time zone should adjust to nature`s balance. In the tropical countries, the sunrise is at 6 am, noon is at 12 am and the sunset is at 6 pm.
Given Indonesia`s natural conditions, it will be very illogical if the country - which extends over a total length of 5,000 km - moves to a single time zone, he stressed.
"In the whole world, no country extending over a total length of 5,000 km has a single time zone, except China, because China`s Communist party made this decision in 1949 to control the power - so the reason was political power," he explained.
The United States has nine time zones, while Australia has three time zones, he pointed out.
In 1942, Japanese occupying forces applied a single time zone in Indonesia because Japan wanted to send a unified tribute to the Japanese emperor at 12 am, he explained.
"Do we want to go back to Japan`s era?" he asked.
According to Kalla, a single time zone has no impact on a nation`s productivity, trading or capital market. In fact, it will waste more energy, because around 200 million people will have to get up one hour earlier and switch on their lights.
(T.M041/Uu.F001/INE/KR-BSR/B003)
Editor: Priyambodo RH
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