January 5, 2024
JAKARTA – A spokesperson for President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo has rejected a proposal to suspend the distribution of social assistance (bansos) during the 2024 presidential campaign and election, saying the program was a lifeline for the country’s poor.
Presidential staff coordinator Ari Dwipayana argued that the social assistance program was designed with poor people in mind to give them basic foodstuffs that would normally be out of reach due to inflation.
“The primary objective of bansos is to serve as a cushion or social protection for the poor, so they can deal with the pressure of high food prices as a result of El Niño and global supply chain disruptions,” Ari said on Thursday, as quoted by Antara.
Ari also said the social assistance program had both political and financial backing from the House of Representatives, which had agreed to fund it through the state budget.
“So this has nothing to do with the current election process,” he said.
A number of senior politicians from rival camps competing against the Prabowo Subianto-Gibran Rakabuming Raka ticket have called for the distribution of social assistance to be suspended, expressing concern that the program could be “politicized” to boost the chance of certain candidates in the election on Feb. 14.
Achmad Baidowi, a central board member of the United Development Party (PPP) backing the presidential candidate Ganjar Pranowo of the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P), claimed the bansos program had become a “propaganda tool.”
“Based on past experiences, when aid was distributed before the election, it was used as a propaganda tool to [sway] public opinion that the program was synonymous with a certain candidate and a certain political party,” he said, as quoted by Antara.
Earlier this week, vice presidential candidate Muhaimin Iskandar expressed his support for the Ganjar-Mahfud MD camp’s proposal to postpone the bansos distribution until after election day.
While Muhaimin concurred that the program was funded by the state budget and was intended to help people meet their basic needs, he suggested that anyone from any campaign team could exploit activities related to the aid’s distribution.
He also said it could disadvantage certain candidates, presidential or vice presidential.
“[Its] postponement is not to limit [social assistance], just to prevent political interests becoming mixed up in its distribution,” Muhaimin said on Tuesday during a visit to a fishing village in Penjaringan, North Jakarta, Antara reported.
But on Wednesday, the Ganjar-Mahfud team issued a clarification, saying it had never proposed suspending the social assistance program.
“I want to emphasize that the national campaign team never advocated stopping or suspending the social assistance program,” said Todung Mulya Lubis, a legal advisor with the Ganjar-Mahfud team.
Todung added that the program needed to continue, as the country’s poor relied on it for their sustenance.