Observer: Prabowo's Speech on Bureaucracy a Warning for All Ranks

Public policy analyst Arfianto Purbolaksono stated that President Prabowo Subianto’s state address at the Annual Session of the People’s Consultative Assembly (MPR RI) regarding the bureaucracy serves as a warning for all ranks, from the ministerial level down to policy implementers in the field. He assessed that the President’s acknowledgement that the bureaucracy often hampers good decisions is a signal that the issue has been longstanding and structural. Consequently, addressing it cannot rely solely on appeals but must be accompanied by concrete and measurable steps at every level of government. “This speech should be a whip for the bureaucratic apparatus in Indonesia. This message must not only target ministers as the President’s aides but must also penetrate down to the level of policy implementers in ministries and institutions,” Arfianto said in a statement in Jakarta on Friday. He noted that the success of various targets outlined by the President in his speech, ranging from food and energy self-sufficiency to improvements in the Free Nutritious Meals (MBG) programme, depends heavily on the performance of ministers and the bureaucracy in consistently executing these directives on the ground. Policy implementation failures, he continued, often occur when there is no shared vision between political officials and the bureaucratic apparatus beneath them. Therefore, according to him, ministers as the President’s aides must be able to manage and control the bureaucracy below them so that government work truly proceeds according to the established targets. “The President’s directives must not stop at the policy level but fail to be translated into concrete execution that is felt by the public,” Arfianto said. Nevertheless, he also appreciated several achievements conveyed by President Prabowo in his speech, including the success of achieving self-sufficiency in eight food commodities ahead of the initial target. “These achievements deserve appreciation. However, this appreciation must go hand in hand with a critical stance, particularly regarding bureaucratic issues that remain the main obstacle to ensuring these achievements are felt evenly by all Indonesian people,” he said. In his state address at the 2026 MPR Annual Session and the Joint Session of the House of Representatives (DPR) and the Regional Representative Council (DPD), President Prabowo Subianto highlighted the problem of convoluted bureaucracy. “We must admit that one of our nation’s problems is a convoluted bureaucracy, a bureaucracy that does not work efficiently,” he said. Prabowo stated that bureaucrats often use their positions and authority to enrich themselves, their families, and their groups. “We must eradicate this, not cover it up,” he asserted.