Febriamy Hutapea & Muninggar Sri Saraswati

Experts Say Campaign Fiscal Platforms Flimsy

All three presidential candidates were criticized on Monday for failing to propose comprehensive policies and targets for the state budget and the nation’s economy as a whole.

Kacung Marijan, a political analyst from Surabaya-based Airlangga University, described the economic promises of the presidential tickets as “too general.”

“They have set certain targets,” he said. “But what kinds of instruments will they use to reach the targets? It’s not clear. Will they use fiscal and monetary instruments? Will they use other instruments? These issues have yet to be discussed in public.”

It was no wonder, Kacung said, that many potential voters considered the campaign promises of all candidates to be empty.

“It is true that we have many voters whose choices are not entirely based on their economic interests, and that their voting decisions are based on ideology or other concerns,” he said. “However, there is a growing number of voters who want each presidential ticket to address these economic issues.”

Yuna Farhan, the secretary general of the Indonesian Forum for Budget Transparency (Fitra), a nongovernmental group that campaigns for budgetary transparency and accountability, said the likelihood of change in overall budget policy in the near future was very small regardless of who came out on top on Wednesday.

Megawati Sukarnoputri and running mate Prabowo Subianto have pledged to meet an ambitious target of 10 percent annual economic growth by 2014 if they were elected.

Emphasizing the development of “a people’s economy,” the pair claimed that they would speed up growth by boosting infrastructure spending, increasing individual wealth and maximizing the use of domestic products and nationalizing natural resources to help establish economic independence.

Incumbent President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono and running mate Boediono put forth a more conservative target of 7 percent annual growth, pointing out that the slowdown in the global economy would affect Indonesia’s performance.

They also suggested that they would seek to allocate a portion of the state budget to improving the country’s social safety net, even at the cost of some pro-growth initiatives.

Vice President Jusuf Kalla and running mate Wiranto have set their sights on posting 8 percent annual growth by 2011, claiming that they will be able to reach the target by cutting subsidies.

Ita Kurniasih, a Fitra researcher, also said that the visions of the candidates for the future of the nation’s key energy sector remained weak.

“It is not clear how the renegotiation of existing contracts [with foreign companies], which was promised by the candidates, will be carried out,” Ita said.

She said that over the past four years, the Supreme Audit Agency (BPK) had found costly irregularities in several contracts involving government ministries or state-owned enterprises.

“This has happened because of the weaknesses of the government institutions that are managing the oil and gas sector,” she said.

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