In effect what the government is saying is that people like these students cannot go out, register a company, design, develop and seek finance to start their own car manufacturing business, because the government thinks it is their domain to dictate what you can and cannot do in industry. Can you imagine if Steve Jobs was Indonesian? It would have had to be a National computer not Apple. Bill Gates and National Windows not Microsoft..... Anything to get their hands on the money... You give foreigners far to much credit JPB most of the colonialism is domestic, the Dutch handed it over to domestic colonial elite and you still have not managed to get rid of them.

At least the last two paragraphs in the article show some reason in this 21st century world.

The government cannot allow........ And you blame foreigners..... Wake up. Use your vote wisely.

JPB- Marsuki said that the government cannot allow .... There plain as day is your colonialism... your elitist cronies that want to grab the money and not allow people like your goodself develop anything you want to. They think in terms of a National car.... Like Proton I suppose but how many other countries have a "national" car and how many car manufacturers are owned or controlled by the government? There is your colonialism... the megalomanic elitist government officials who do not think the people are entitled to privately make their own product.

Forget the foreigners you don't get that far, your own government puts a stop to it before they get a look in.

The arrogance is breathtaking by the clown Marsuki but his sentiments are that " give the common people a house, a job, food and roads and leave the elite to make the rules and govern. The common people are not intelligent enough" his words....

Please stop blaming the foreigners for everything in this country. A lot of problems in this country is related to the desire of some local politicians and business men to make money quick, basically greed. It is much easier to start digging for coal than to set up a high tech company. I am living in the middle of the main industrial zones in East Jakarta and there are very gperformant Indonesian companies working for the Japanese automotive industry. One of the main problems is the lack of leadership. This country needs a president who has a clear idea about the future of the country, who can understand the country needs to focus on education if Indonesia wants to occupy the place it deserves. But unfortunately, it is easier to manipulate poor uneducated people during the election by giving them tshirt and instant noodle. Jchay, I agree with you, I cannot understand why most of the canned fruits here are coming from Thailand. This is a shame. But nothing to do with the colonial time

@jpb: forget foreigners, at this point I just want us to believe that Indonesia must first free themselves from their own "local" colonialists (such as House representatives and government officials) who constantly push more imports of natural produces such as rice fruits salt etc (for their own benefits) and push away the wellfare of our own farmers! Seriously if we want to talk about sustainability, we have much more chances to be "sustainable" and even be known as the best in the world in these areas where our strength is. Let's first yield those "low-hanging" fruits before we start talking and being all emotional about national car or plane..

It is indeed, JPB, the solution being Indonesians putting aside the religious and ethnic differences that have been used to divide and conquer them and realising their common interests. These interests, at an economic level, might include identifying their common enemies, namely neo-liberal trans-national economic power and the country's venal domestic elite who conspire with said power for their 30 pieces of silver.