Frankly, he should have acted earlier. They acted tough, chided us and when the pollution reading went thru the roof and the eyes of the World were on him then he apologised. And this is not the first time. It first began 16 years ago and has occurred on an intermittent basis.
I am sure there are no laws forbidding him to speak earlier.
The argument that their own people are suffering is really irrelevant. Just because they neglect their own people does it mean they are less culpable to the rest of us. Tell that to the people of Muar.
My sense is that Indonesia has crossed the line in the sand. If we do not see prosecution by them of major companies as the post 1997 Indonesian laws are now applicable, any apology is meaningless.
Lets get real here - why the admiration as nothing has changed just yet.
There are two forces at work here. The obvious, and major one is forest clearing by oil palm companies. This has gone of for two decades and Indon has done nothing to stop them, not even all those legislation has proved effective because no enforcement at all.
The second force is the poverty trap that the villagers are stuck in as a result of the social system, and the system of land ownership which essentially compels them to stake claim on land through forest clearing and cultivation.
The point is that these poor villagers may have no choice, but clearly the rich oil palm companies have a choice. Majority are owned on the Indon and Malaysian side, but we also have stake in them. The government of Indonesia also has basically ignored the issue for two decades. It is not too far a stretch to assume that many officials are on the take from the oil palm industry with hands in cookie jar.
Unless there is some way for the wider international community to inflict financial damage via sanctions against companies or other means, things will not change.