Academics Warn of Civilian Supremacy as Military Development Battalion Discourse Draws Scrutiny

Binus University Business Law lecturer Muhammad Reza Syarifuddin Zaki has highlighted the massive expansion of the military into the civilian sphere. He assessed that the formation of Territorial Development Battalions (BTP), the involvement of soldiers in food affairs, and the placement of former military personnel in civilian institutions constitute a serious alarm for democracy and civilian supremacy in Indonesia. The warning was delivered during a public discussion entitled “The Upheaval of the Territorial Development Battalion: Citizen Rejection and the Defence Minister’s Policy Direction” in Central Jakarta on Thursday, 4 June 2026. According to Reza, the current situation indicates a distortion in the governance of state defence. He said the military is slowly no longer positioned solely as a tool of state defence but has begun entering civilian spaces that have long been the domain of civil society and technocratic ministries. “The public hopes for strong civilian supremacy. But what is happening now is that civilian spaces are slowly being taken over by the military,” Reza stated on Friday, 5 June 2026. He criticised the involvement of soldiers in the food sector, agriculture, and regional development, which he considers increasingly distant from the TNI’s primary function as a state defence tool. “The state seems lazy about building civilian capacity. In fact, we were promised 19 million jobs for civil society, yet what is being expanded instead is military recruitment and battalion construction,” he said. According to him, this policy has the potential to seize civilian job sectors that have long been handled by technical ministries such as the Ministry of Agriculture, the Ministry of Health, and the Ministry of Public Works. “The question is, why should the state disburse a large budget for two institutions performing similar functions? Haven’t these sectors had their own civilian apparatus and professional personnel from the start?” he stated. In the forum, Reza also touched on an alleged corruption case within the National Nutrition Agency (BGN) that implicated several former military personnel. He judged that this incident shattered the assumption that a military background automatically guarantees clean and transparent governance in civilian institutions. According to him, this case must serve as an important note that placing military personnel in civilian posts does not necessarily deliver better accountability.