March 3, 2025
JAKARTA – A plan floated by President Prabowo Subianto to place representatives of religious organizations on the advisory board of the newly launched sovereign wealth fund Danantara has garnered mixed reactions, with analysts warning it could be an attempt to dampen public criticism of the controversial fund.
Prabowo last week launched Danantara, a multibillion-dollar fund that serves as both an investment vehicle and a holding company for all state-owned enterprises, representing a major part of the government’s efforts to achieve its ambitious growth targets.
Prior to the fund’s launch, the President said he was open to having leaders of the country’s religious organizations and former presidents serve on the advisory board of Danantara, which will manage about US$900 billion in assets.
The Indonesian Bishop’s Conference (KWI) responded with caution, with executive secretary Paulus Christian Siswantoko saying the group had not made any decision on whether it would join the advisory board if it was officially invited.
While Prabowo had specifically mentioned the KWI as a possible institution to be represented on Danatara’s advisory board, Siswantoko told The Jakarta Post there had not been any discussion with the government about the proposal.
Indonesian Communion of Churches (PGI) chairman Jacklevyn Fritz Manuputty welcomed Prabowo’s idea but also noted that the PGI, “as a religious institution, does not have the competence to take part in the oversight of Danantara”.
He said the PGI would be “willing to recommend figures with expertise from the Christian community only if requested” by the government and that the people in question would not act as representatives of the group.
“But we have not yet been contacted [by anyone from the government] to discuss it,” he said in a press release.
Meanwhile, several members of the country’s largest Muslim group, Nahdlatul Ulama (NU), welcomed Prabowo’s suggestion, saying the inclusion of religious organizations in the oversight of Danantara would have a “positive” impact on the moral choices of the executives.
“The presence of figures from religious groups […], with their spiritual piety to God Almighty, can hopefully safeguard everyone involved in the agency from various deviations,” Ahmad Fahrur Rozi of the NU central board told the Post on Saturday.
But NU chairman Yahya Staquf Cholil said earlier that the group had not decided whether it would join the advisory board, noting that the government had not been in contact to discuss the details of the President’s plan.
Anwar Abbas of the central board of Muhammadiyah, the country’s second-largest Muslim group, said religious organizations participating in the advisory board would serve as “a moral fortress” to ensure the management of state assets did not deviate from the principles of social justice.
He added that it was important to establish “a clear and independent mechanism” for religious organizations to perform their supervisory function, otherwise the role would be a mere formality.
Presidential Communications Office head Hasan Nasbi said last week that including religious groups on Danantara’s advisory board was intended to “maintain the accountability and transparency” of the management of the sovereign wealth fund.
Some analysts, however, viewed the move as one of political expedience, drawing parallels to the controversial decision of former president Joko “Jokowi” Widodo to offer mining concessions to religious organizations such as NU.
“Prabowo’s suggestion might be aimed at securing support from religious groups for Danantara in the hope of dampening public criticism and boosting the legitimacy of the superholding,” said Sukron Kamil, a professor at Jakarta’s Syarif Hidayatullah State Islamic University.
Sukron pointed to online campaigns calling for people to withdraw their money from state-owned banks under the superholding and deposit the funds in private ones, amid the country’s long history of mismanagement of state-owned enterprises.
Political analyst Adi Prayitno of think tank Parameter Politik Indonesia said Prabowo was seeking to involve various segments of the public in the oversight of Danantara in order to boost its public image and give the impression that the initiative served the interests of the people.
He suggested that religious groups should instead play a supervisory role from outside of Danantara, while “the appointment of the Danantara advisory board members should be based only on track record and expertise”.