Deputy Interior Minister Urges Regional Heads to Stop Irrational Procurements, Citing Massage Chairs and Excessive Official Vehicles

REPUBLIKA.CO.ID, SEMARANG – Deputy Interior Minister Bima Arya Sugiarto has urged regional heads not to allocate budgets for unreasonable procurements. He reminded that in today’s environment, the public can easily disseminate or viralise such matters.

Bima explained that one of the tasks mandated to him by the Interior Minister is to remind regional heads about budgeting. The Interior Ministry desires that every region uses its budget effectively.

“Ladies and gentlemen, today everything can go viral. We all must be careful not to budget for something unreasonable: expensive massage chairs, excessive official vehicles, unreasonable consultant fees, a string of ineffective expert teams, and so on,” said Bima while attending the Deliberation of the Central Java Province RPJPD 2027 at the Central Java Governor’s Office in Semarang City on Tuesday (28/4/2026).

Bima chose not to mention which government or regional head made such procurements. “Without naming a specific region. But this is the message (not to make unreasonable procurements),” he stated.

On that occasion, Bima asked regional governments, particularly the Central Java Provincial Government, to increase regional own-source revenue (PAD). He assessed that more homework regarding PAD and fiscal capacity is faced by district/city level governments.

According to him, one thing that can be done by regional governments to boost their PAD is by optimising regional assets. “How these assets are inventoried, then processed into economic growth centres. Well, this is asset optimisation,” said Bima.

He added that another thing regional governments can do is to utilise national programmes. Bima revealed that Jambi City is one example that has successfully utilised national programmes for economic growth in its area.

Bima mentioned that the Jambi City Regional Budget is only Rp2 trillion. “But when calculated, the central assistance that it successfully brought into the city amounts to Rp2 trillion as well. Because of persistent searching, lobbying, and escorting,” he said.

“Then for every programme, he knows it, he ensures the supply chain for MDGs, he lobbies all local vendors. He ensures that those recruited for the kitchen are people who are indeed worthy and in need of work. Thus, the impact in the last year is that poverty has decreased, open unemployment has decreased, stunting has decreased, HDI has increased, growth has increased, and the Gini ratio can also be managed well. This is an interesting example,” added Bima.