AFTER promising a number of times not to raise fuel prices until 2009, President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono was forced to go back on his word. Three weeks ago, he announced that the price of gasoline would be 20 to 30 percent higher.

Although no announcement has yet been made, waves of protests denouncing the plan broke out all over the country last week. In some cases, police clashed with protestors when they tried to block off petrol stations fr