The government plans to amend several regulations that have been widely blamed for slowing attempts to expedite state-budget spending, particularly for infrastructure development.
During a Cabinet meeting on Wednesday, President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo instructed related ministers to reform the current system, which had created bottlenecks for both central and local governments when trying to spend their budgets.
Coordinating Economic Minister Sofyan Djalil said that the current state budget procurement system was deemed too complicated and had caused many officials to end up in prison for violating procurement regulations.
“We will study the procurement procedures and will review the overall presidential decree and regulations to produce a perfect revision of the procurement mechanism,” he said. “We want spending procedures to be swift but accountable.”
Weak budget disbursement over the last decade has been partly blamed for holding back the country from garnering economic growth of over 6 percent annually.–The Jakarta Post
