Why would anyone in their right mind want to holiday in Bali?

Elizabeth Krantz - 1 October 2005

Australian Schapelle Corby languishes in a stinking Bali jail cell while nine young Australians face having their lives snuffed out in front of a firing squad if found guilty of importing heroin. Their fate is in the hands of the notoriously corrupt Indonesian legal system.

There are stories of corrupt undercover Bali police suppling drugs to local Balinese who in turn try to entrap young Westerners in police scams. Plans to conduct random nightspot and dance party raids in Bali involving a police demand for urine samples from patrons were revealed recently by Bali drug squad chief Bambang Sugiarto. Indonesia's draconian approach to drugs will only enrich the drug lords and invite more corruption. I have long advocated taking the control of drug distribution out of the hands of criminal gangs and placing it under government control. See: The drugs menace and its solution.

Fanatical Muslim terrorists killed 88 Australians in the Bali bombing atrocity in October 2002. Last year a suicide bomber exploded a massive bomb in front of the Australian embassy in Jakarta, killing ten Indonesians. A 60 minutes program about two years revealed simmering resentment and dislike of Australians among a majority of Indonesian university students.

Now we are told that in spite of urgent warnings about the possibility of a bird flu pandemic and the deaths of a number of Indonesians, the Indonesian government is totally unprepared to deal with such a catastrophe.

I won't be holidaying in Bali anytime soon.