TEMPO.CO, Jakarta - President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo expects all ministries and state agencies to be serious in using the state budget. “Don’t steal even a penny from the APBN [state budget],” he said at the State Palace in Jakarta on Wednesday, December 7, 2016.
According to him, corruption prevention mechanism is already in place. The President, however, reiterated the danger of corruption in budget process since the 2017 state budget is enormous.
In the 2017 state budget, the Government sets state revenue at Rp1,750 trillion and state expenditure at Rp2,080 trillion. The President handed over 20,646 budget warrants (DIPAs) worth Rp763.6 trillion (36.7 percent) to ministries/state agencies and DIPAs of fund transfers to regional governments and village funds worth Rp764.9 trillion (36.8 percent).
Jokowi added that the amount of village fund allocation for 2017 will add more money to village coffers. He has asked regional heads to supervise the use of village funds. “It’s a lot of money. Don’t steal even a penny [from it],” the President said.
President Jokowi today handed over budget warrants (DIPAs) 2017 to ministries and state agencies at the State Palace. DIPA is budget implementation document serving as the basis for state expenditure and disbursement of the state budget. Early delivery of DIPA is aimed at accelerating budget disbursement at central and regional level.
In his opening speech, Jokowi said that the state budget should become an instrument to reduce poverty, unemployment rate and close income inequality gap. He expects that poverty rate can be reduced by 10.5 percent. “Gini ratio can be pushed down to 0.39 and the unemployment rate to [be reduced] to 5.6 percent,” he said.
ADITYA BUDIMAN
