TANA TORAJA, Indonesia, Sept 4 (Reuters) – Indonesia’s top human rights body urged the police on Friday to investigate several new outbreaks of food poisoning linked to President Prabowo Subianto’s flagship programme to provide free meals to students, which made 2,000 people sick this week.
In separate cases across at least three major Indonesian islands, more than 2,000 students and teachers fell ill after eating lunch issued by the government as part of a scheme to eradicate malnutrition launched by Prabowo last year.
“Rights to food, especially safe-to-consume food, are human rights,” the Indonesian independent rights body known as Komnas HAM said in a statement.
“Without a rigorous sanitation standard … the nutrition intervention that the state is doing will lose its moral legitimacy,” it said.
Komnas HAM called on the police to launch a probe into the poisoning cases, without providing further details. The National Police did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The rights group also called on the National Nutrition Agency, which oversees the programme, to suspend the kitchens allegedly responsible for the poisoning outbreaks.
Some 170 students and teachers in the South Sulawesi region of Tana Toraja also fell ill after eating the free meals on Thursday, local government head Zadrak Tombeg said, following more than 1,700 cases spread across the provinces of Central Java, East Java, and West Sumatra.
Another 256 students in an East Java region also fell sick after consuming the meals this week, news website CNN Indonesia reported on Friday.
The overseeing agency was slated to hold a press conference on Friday, but delayed it without providing a reason or a rescheduled time.
It did not immediately respond to a request for comment, but agency head Sudaryono said on Thursday that the poisoning cases would be handled seriously.
As of September 1, 50,000 individuals had been affected by food poisoning, lawmaker Charles Honoris said on Wednesday, citing health department data, with some previous cases blamed on improper food storage and the late delivery of cooked meals.
Prabowo’s beleaguered programme has become increasingly unpopular among the public, with only one-third of Indonesians surveyed in July expressing satisfaction with the scheme, pollster Saiful Mujani Research and Consulting said. Many respondents cited the poisoning cases as a reason.
Ester Patandung, whose child was hospitalised in Tana Toraja, told Reuters, “My hope as a parent is for the central or regional government to cancel the free meal programme.”
(Reporting by Abd Rahman Muchtar in Tana Toraja; Stanley Widianto and Ananda Teresia in Jakarta; Editing by David Stanway)
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