Indonesian President Joko Widodo may find himself without a challenger in the next election.While Prabowo Subianto – leader of the main opposition party and runner up in the 2014 election – has accepted his party’s endorsement, it’s uncertain if he can assemble a viable coalition to be nominated by an August deadline.
Indonesian President Joko Widodo has declared war on inflation, with a series of pre-emptive strikes designed to woo voters. The potential casualty: his zeal for economic reform.While price pressures are relatively benign in Southeast Asia’s largest economy, Widodo is leaving nothing to chance as a long election campaign draws near. He’s slapped controls on fuel costs and ordered additional imports of various staples from salt to buffalo meat.
When former president of the United States (US), Barack Obama mooted the idea of the Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP) to Indonesia’s president, Joko Widodo in 2015, the latter opted for a ‘wait and see’ approach. He expressed his opinion to the architect of the “Pivot to Asia” that the largest economy in Southeast Asia will only join upon the ratification and implementation of the deal by all its current members.
China’s massive build program to recreate trade routes stretching from Asia to Africa and Europe is gaining momentum.Since President Xi Jinping’s flagship Belt and Road project was announced about five years ago, it gave impetus to billions of dollars of Chinese investment – some of which were already in the pipeline for several years – to build railways, roads, ports and power plants.Here’s a quick take on what Xi describes as the ‘project of the century’The program isn’t without controversy
The largest democracy in Southeast Asia is gearing up for its upcoming elections season. Indonesians will go to the polls twice, once this year and once again in the following year. The country’s local elections will be held first and is slated for 27 June, this year. These elections are being held to elect 17 governors, 39 mayors and 115 regents across Indonesia. Meanwhile, the Presidential elections will be held on 17 April, 2019.
Indonesian President, Joko Widodo’s – also known as Jokowi – suggestion that it would be a “good idea” for Australia to join the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) was certainly cause for some baffled reactions which soon sparked a flurry of speculations. Coming just before the ASEAN-Australia special summit, one cannot be faulted for being sceptical of his endorsement.
When Indonesian president Joko Widodo was elected in 2014, he vowed to boost economic growth to 7% of gross domestic product (GDP). Subsequently, plans to spend around US$355 billion building a total of 265 projects by 2019 were announced, in a bid to bridge the US$1.5 trillion infrastructure gap Indonesia still had in comparison to other emerging economies, according to the World Bank in 2017.
Election fever has started to sweep Indonesia. The largest democracy in Southeast Asia heads to the polls twice in the next year and a half.
The Indonesian government has relinquished control over nine tracts of forest to the indigenous communities that have lived there for generations, President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo announced at a recent conference on land tenure in Jakarta.The move follows the government’s recognition last December of nine other communities’ rights to their ancestral forests, in line with a 2013 decision by Indonesia’s highest court that removed indigenous peoples’ customary forests from under state control.“The
Indonesia's economy grew more slowly than expected in the third quarter, dimming hopes that a high-profile drive to boost Southeast Asia's biggest economy will hit its GDP target this year.The economy expanded 5.06 percent in the July-September period from a year ago, a little below market expectations and off the government's target of 5.2 percent growth for 2017.President Joko Widodo came to power in 2014 on a pledge to boost annual growth to seven percent annually but his go
Indonesian authorities are investigating if former presidential candidate Prabowo Subianto and the children of ex-dictator Suharto, named in documents leaked from a Bermuda law firm, are in breach of the country’s tax laws.The tax office will scrutinise financial disclosures made by Subianto in the past to check against information contained in the massive leak of confidential information from offshore law firm Appleby Global Group Services, Hestu Yoga Saksama, a spokesman for the Directorate
In the Dutch language, gijzeling means to take someone hostage. In Indonesia, that’s how authorities describe their strategy to deal with tax dodgers, throwing dozens of people in jail as part of a national crackdown.Eight months after the government closed an amnesty programme that gave Indonesians a chance to come clean on their tax affairs, it’s taking aggressive action to deal with those who still haven’t paid up.
