Indonesia Tries to Sell Its Treasure Again

From the Jakarta Globe:
Indonesia to Ease Auction Rules to Lure Treasure Bidders

The government is revising its bidding procedures for a cache of salvaged historical artifacts, following last week’s aborted auction that had aimed to raise $80 million but failed to get a single bid, an official at the maritime affairs ministry said on Sunday.

The auction flop has polarized the debate on whether such items are too valuable, historically, to be sold off.

Aji Sularso, director general of supervision at the Maritime Affairs and Fisheries Ministry, said officials would meet on Monday to discuss alternative procedures for the auction of 271,000 pieces of ceramics and jewelry recovered from a shipwreck off Cirebon, West Java.

“Having learned from the first auction, we’re evaluating the procedures for the next one,” he said.

Wednesday’s auction of 10th-century treasures was called off after five minutes because there were no bidders. The ministry had required a deposit of $16 million for the right to bid, about 20 percent of the minimum amount it sought to raise.

“We’ll probably be more flexible on the deposit,” Aji said.

He added that another problem was that the auction had been announced at short notice, giving potential bidders only a week to register and submit their deposits.

Aji said an overhaul of the bidding procedure would be crucial to enabling the ministry to auction off more such items within the country, rather than through auction houses elsewhere.

Indonesian waters, historically busy shipping lanes, are believed to house numerous wrecks carrying valuable cargo. Aji put the number at more than 480.

The Cirebon haul was recovered by Belgian salvager Luc Heymans’ Cosmix Underwater Research and its local partner, PT Paradigma Putra Sejahtera.

Paradigma CEO Adi Agung Tirtamarta welcomed further discussions with the ministry on loosening up the bidding procedure.

“It’ll be good for Indonesia to get its hands on treasures found in its own waters,” he said, adding that in the past such finds were looted and taken overseas.

The issue of looting grabbed public attention recently, following unproven allegations that salvager Michael Hatcher had plundered wrecks in Indonesian waters and sold them abroad. Hatcher had been wanted for allegedly attempting to smuggle salvaged artifacts out of the country. Police later said there are no charges against Hatcher, who is reportedly working on a wreck off Subang, West Java with local operator PT Comexindo.

“We believe the items in Subang could be worth more than the Cirebon haul,” Aji said, adding it could take months to bring the lot to the surface.

The issue has raised the question of whether the items should be sold at all.

National Museum spokesman Ferlian Putra warned of the items “falling into the wrong hands,” and said they should be preserved at the museum.

Aji, however, said there were too many items for local museums to house, and it made “no sense” to keep them in Indonesia. “The museums can exhibit small samples of these treasures,” he said.