Sandiaga Uno Reacts to Protest over Entertainment Tax Hike of up to 75%

TEMPO.CO, Jakarta - Indonesian Minister of Tourism and Creative Economy Sandiaga Uno responded to protests over the hike in the entertainment tax to 40-75 percent as regulated in Law No. 1 of 2022.

“Don't worry, the government is here with policies that surely support [business actors in the tourism sector],” Sandiaga said at The Weekly Brief with Sandi Uno in Jakarta on Monday, January 15.

According to the regulation, certain goods and services tax for entertainment services in karaoke places, nightclubs, bars, and spas is set at a minimum of 40 percent and a maximum of 75 percent.

In his Instagram, Sandiaga said that the regulation is still under judicial review at the Constitutional Court (MK) and that the ministry ensured that the policy aims to empower economic agents in the tourism industry and the creative economy.

“We will continue to fight for the welfare of creative economy players, to create jobs, and we will ensure that we will not cut the tourism and creative economy industry which is already recovering,” Sandiaga Uno stressed.

Singer Inul Daratista objected to this tax policy. She said that Inul Vizta has 5,000 employees who depend on the karaoke business for their livelihood. The number declined significantly compared to before the pandemic, which reached 9,000 people.

Previously, the Indonesian Tourism Industry Association (GIPI) Bali said that some spa entrepreneurs in Bali filed a judicial review to the Constitutional Court regarding the article regulating tax rates and classification in Law No. 1 of 2022. “Hopefully, [the tax increase] can at least be postponed,” the association’s chairman Ida Bagus Agung Parta Adnyana said in Nusa Dua, Badung on January 11.

ANTARA

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