DPR Pushes New BGN Chief to Build Anti-Corruption System for Free Nutritious Meals Programme

Member of Commission III of the Indonesian House of Representatives (DPR RI), Abdullah, is pushing the leadership of the National Nutrition Agency (BGN) to build a new system to close corruption loopholes in the implementation of the Free Nutritious Meals (MBG) programme. This was conveyed by Abdullah in response to the naming of suspects and detention of former BGN Head and Deputy Head, Dadan Hindayana, Lodewijk Pusung and Sony Sonjaya, by the Indonesian Attorney General’s Office regarding a case of buying and selling MBG Service Provision Point (SPPG) locations. Abdullah wants the implementation of MBG to run cleanly, transparently, and sustainably. Therefore, he has asked the new Head of BGN, Nanik S. Deyang, to make the development of an anti-corruption MBG system the top priority of her leadership. “The main job of the new BGN Head is to restore public trust by building an anti-corruption MBG system. If the system is fixed, the benefits of this programme will be increasingly felt by the community and its grand objective of improving the nutritional quality of Indonesian children can be achieved,” said Abdullah in his statement on Friday, 5 June 2026. Abdullah assessed that the case ensnaring Dadan and his colleagues must serve as an important lesson for BGN to carry out comprehensive reforms. He asked the new leadership to ensure that the loopholes allegedly exploited in the case are not repeated in the future. “Do not let a change of leadership only replace people without fixing the system. What must be built is governance that is transparent, accountable, and can be openly supervised,” he stressed. According to him, one step that can be taken is to build a digital system that allows the public to access information and data on MBG implementation in real time, including regarding performance, programme distribution, budget utilisation, and the achievements of implementing partners. “Transparency is one of the most effective ways to close off space for irregularities. When data and information can be accessed by the public, the opportunity for manipulation becomes smaller because supervision is carried out not only by the government, but also by the community,” he said. In addition to strengthening transparency, the National Awakening Party (PKB) legislator assessed that BGN must be more open to criticism and input from various parties. According to him, fact- and data-based criticism is an important part of efforts to improve the quality of the programme’s governance.