SBY's likely win welcomed by Indonesian business sector
Updated
Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono looks set to win a second term, after a 'quick count' of the votes gave him a massive lead over his rivals.
Television media polls in Jakarta gave SBY over 58 percent of the vote, compared to 26 percent for opposition leader Megawati Sukarnoputri and 15 percent for outgoing vice-president Jusuf Kalla. Final official results are not expected for a few weeks, but early signs suggest SBY will avoid a second-round vote in September.
A win for President Yudhoyono will be regarded favourably by the money markets and the business sector generally, although Indonesians want more progress, more quickly.
Presenter: Karon Snowdon
Speakers: H.S. Dillon, Economic advisor ; Ahmad Erani Yustika, Director Institute for Development of Economics and Finance
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SNOWDON: Indonesia's economy is not doing too badly considering the global financial crisis hit it later and with less impact than some.
Indonesia is not in recession like several of its neighbours, but South East Asia's largest economy should be doing better.
H.S. Dillon is a columnist and advisor to state owned companies in Indonesia. He has the ear of the President. He says ongoing challenges like poverty have been highlighted by the crisis.
DILLON: Right now with a two dollar a day head count half of the population is still poor and that's bad news. In that sense what you have to do is to turn them from liabilities into an asset and the way is what the Chinese have done, have really mass education, really get these people up.
SNOWDON: And provide jobs for them?
DILLON: Yes, not only jobs. You see when I worked in the countryside thirty years ago we just removed the barriers and they created their own jobs.
SNOWDON: And education is a key in this?
DILLION: Education and what I call the capital formation of the household level, the landless labourers, the landless labourers households - are they able to generate a surplus, are they forming any capital that would then enable them to move up?
SNOWDON: Despite the promises, the results of the last five years have been less than hoped for. In short what good is food security if the urban poor can't afford to buy rice?
What good is free primary school education if corrupt buearocrats demand illegal payments that parents can't meet?
And what good are relatively healthy economic statistics if large regions miss out on economic growth?
The eastern areas of Papua, Sulawesi and Kalimantan in the north remain extremely poor compared to the more prosperous west and Java.
And according to Ahmad Erani Yustika, the Director of the Institute for Development of Economics and Finance in Jakarta, inequality has become worse.
He believes little will change if SBY serves another five years.
YUSTIKA: President Yudhoyono does not have any sensitivity to of the issue, especially inequality between west and east in Indonesia. In this point I think Jusuf kalla has more sensitivity to cope [with] this problem.
SNOWDON: Another five year term for SBY will at least mean political stability that many commentators want to see translated into stronger reform.
There are calls from business for less regulation. From others for better governance in the regions.
HS Dillon says Indonesia is failing to meet its potential, it needs more investment and to make more of its underutilised human resources.
DILLON: And that is very important now because we have regional autonomy but there is very little regional capacity. Look at Papua. None of us from the outside can go and build Papua for them, we can only help them, they have to build Papua themselves. And when the quality of governance is so low, its very difficult. You can give them all the funds in the wolrd but very few of them is going to reach the people.
