Analyst says cancellation of KDMP manager penalty was the right move

Jakarta - Public Policy Analyst Trubus Rahardiansah has assessed that the cancellation of the Rp100 million penalty fine for prospective managers of the Merah Putih Village/Sub-district Cooperative (KDMP) who resign is the right move. He said the decision shows the government is willing to listen to public aspirations while evaluating regulations deemed burdensome for prospective cooperative managers. “The policy indeed needed to be removed because it created fear, causing many prospective managers to choose to resign,” Trubus said in a statement in Jakarta on Thursday. According to him, the penalty provision had the potential to hinder the recruitment of competent human resources to manage the KDMP. Trubus believes the spirit of cooperatives should encourage community participation in managing the village and sub-district economy, rather than imposing excessive burdens on prospective managers. “The spirit of cooperatives should encourage community participation, not impose excessive burdens,” he said. He stated that guidance and supervision of cooperative managers should be carried out through more proportional reward and sanction mechanisms. If a manager is unable to perform their duties optimally, he continued, evaluation can be conducted through administrative sanctions or incentive adjustments based on performance, not by imposing a large fine. “That way, there is a fair mechanism of rewards and consequences, without having to burden prospective managers with a very large penalty,” he said. According to him, regulatory certainty is needed to ensure the process of forming the KDMP runs better. He also assessed that the government’s decision is important to maintain certainty for selection participants while preventing confusion in the community. Meanwhile, the National Selection Committee (Panselnas) has removed the Rp100 million penalty provision in the human resources selection for the 2026 KDMP and Merah Putih Fishermen’s Village programme. The provision was previously listed in Appendix I of the Statement Letter Point 13, which regulated financial consequences for participants who resign after being declared to have passed the selection. Through Announcement Number 09 of 2026, signed by the Deputy Head of the State-Owned Enterprise Regulatory Agency (BP BUMN) Tedi Bharata on 17 June 2026, Panselnas stated that the penalty provision is no longer valid as part of refining the selection process to be more open and accountable. Panselnas also reopened the opportunity for participants who previously resigned due to objections to the provision to continue the selection process until 23 June 2026.