The Elephant in the State's Graphics

There is a proverb that remains relevant regarding the elephant in the eye that remains unseen. Something large, close, and seemingly impossible to miss, yet remains invisible. In a modern state, that ‘eye’ can be interpreted as a graph or an infographic.

We are increasingly able to read situations and figures easily, as they are presented daily on our mobile screens. Economic growth, investment, exports, inflation, budget realisation, the area of land saved, to the trillions of rupiah successfully returned to the state. Everything is neatly organised. Some parts even appear quite convincing.

In July 2026, Indonesia recorded a trade surplus of approximately US$130 million. Exports grew by about 6 per cent compared to the previous year. Inflation in August stood at 3.19 per cent, remaining within Bank Indonesia’s target corridor. The government’s optimism regarding these substances is not entirely an illusion.

President Prabowo has also been consistent with a more aggressive narrative regarding growth: that Indonesia is actually wealthy, but has suffered from leakages for too long. Prabowo has spoken about corruption, smuggling, illegal mining, problematic concessions, and even mafias within the government itself. In October 2025, Prabowo even openly emphasised that there must be no mafia within the government and that the leakage of resources could lead the nation to failure.

This grand narrative was followed by action. In May 2026, the Forest Area Order Task Force reported that since February 2025, the government had reclaimed approximately 5.89 million hectares of palm oil plantation areas. At the same time, the government reported revenues of around Rp10.27 trillion from administrative fines, taxes, and other revenue sources as part of this enforcement. About 2.37 million hectares of forest areas were also returned to the state during that phase. These are not small figures. The courage to disturb the organisational structures and rent-seeking methods that have enjoyed state weakness for years certainly deserves appreciation.

However, the problem begins precisely after the applause ends. “If the nation’s wealth is successfully reclaimed, when will the people start feeling they have received it back?”

Graphs Moving in a Different Direction

There is another set of graphs that has recently been moving in a different direction. Poltracking Indonesia recorded public satisfaction with the Prabron-Gibran administration at 78.1 per cent in October 2025. That figure fell to 74.1 per cent in March 2026, 72.2 per cent in May, then plummeted to 58.4 per cent in July and dropped again to 55.1 per cent in August 2026.

In less than a year, there was a decrease of approximately 23 percentage points. Poltracking is not the only one capturing this symptom. Saiful Mujani Research and Consulting (SMRC) recorded satisfaction with President Prabowo’s performance at 81.2 per cent in November 2025. By late February to early March 2026, the figure fell to 66.4 per cent. Last July, it was only 51.1 per cent. In nine months, the decline was about 30 percentage points.

Meanwhile, Media Survei Nasional, or Median, through a face-to-face survey from 21 July to 2 August 2026 involving 1,212 respondents, obtained a satisfaction rate for the Prabowo-Gibran administration of 56.2 per cent.

Of course, figures from different institutions should not be mixed like quick counts in a coffee shop. Methods, data collection timing, sample size, and the objects of questioning are not always identical. SMRC measures satisfaction with President Prabowo, while Poltracking and Median ask about the Prabowo-Gibran administration. Interview methods also differ. However, these methodological differences do not erase the major signal.

Two institutions with long-running measurement series, Poltracking and SMRC, capture the same direction: public satisfaction is on a downward trend. And when searching at the grassroots level, the economy emerges like an elephant that refuses to leave the room.

In the August 2026 Poltracking survey, satisfaction with the economic sector was only 41.8 per cent, the lowest compared to other sectors. As many as 44.3 per cent of respondents cited the high cost of basic necessities as the main problem, while 62.5 per cent stated that their household expenditures are now higher compared to the previous year.

SMRC provides an even harsher picture. In November 2025, 40 per cent of citizens rated the national economic condition as good or very good. By July 2026, this had dropped to 15.7 per cent. Conversely, those who rated the economy as bad or very bad increased from 22.7 per cent in November 2025 to 31.7 per cent in February-March 2026, then surged to 49.4 per cent in July.

This is where the elephant begins to appear. The state’s figures still look good. What is beginning to diverge is reality: the government’s graphs and the people’s experience are no longer telling the same story.

The national economy can grow. Exports can rise. Inflation can remain within targets. However, households cannot live in aggregates. The state reads the economy in percentages. The people read it by how much remains after rent, school, electricity, transport, instalments, and grocery shopping are paid. Both can be correct. However, both are not necessarily telling the same story.

Cleaning up the Nation

At this point, Prabowo’s “cleanup” agenda becomes increasingly important for us to test. There is a tendency to read the government’s recent breakthroughs as an attempt to eliminate the mafia or interest networks left over from the previous era. Some of this is indeed grounded in fact. The issues of concessions, illegal mining, the leakage of natural wealth, smuggling, and various organisational structures and rent-seeking methods currently being regulated certainly did not emerge after October 2024. Many have grown for years, even spanning multiple administrations.

However, to label all of them as “mafia from the previous era” is too easy. Prabowo himself does not lead a government that was born from a vacuum. There is continuity…