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The ministers of President Prabowo Subianto's Red and White Cabinet gathering for a group photo on Oct 21, 2024, after their swearing-in ceremony at the Presidential Palace in Jakarta. - Antara
JAKARTA: A new survey released by pollster Indikator Politik Indonesia on Monday (Jan 27) showed that a large majority of Indonesians approve of President Prabowo Subianto’s first few months in office, largely due to his firm leadership and because his campaign promises have begun to take shape.
The poll was conducted from Jan 16 to 21, a week before Prabowo and Vice President Gibran Rakabuming Raka hit their first 100-day mark on Tuesday.
Indikator interviewed face-to-face 1,220 respondents of voting age nationwide, and the survey had a 2.9 per cent margin of error at a 95 per cent confidence level.
A total of 79.3 per cent of respondents approve of the work Prabowo has done as president so far, 16.9 per cent disapprove while the remaining 3.8 per cent either are neutral or did not answer.
Indikator’s founder Burhanuddin Muhtadi described the high approval rating as a “good start” and “massive political capital” for Prabowo going forward into his administration.
“This indicates that the political honeymoon between Prabowo and the public has yet to end [...] and so far, there is no indication that this phase will end anytime soon,” Burhanuddin said during the release of the survey.
The main reason for respondents’ approval of Prabowo’s performance was because the former Army general was “firm, commanding, brave and wise” and that the corruption eradication campaign was “going smoothly” during his presidency.
Another reason was because his flagship programmes, particularly the free nutritious meals programme for schoolchildren and pregnant women, had started to materialise.
The Indikator survey showed that 64.6 percent of respondents were satisfied with Prabowo’s flagship free meal programme, though a significant portion of 20.7 per cent thought otherwise.
Yet, over 87 per cent of respondents approved of the programme, regardless of whether they were satisfied or not with how it was being run.
The high job approval rating, Burhanuddin said, was also because Prabowo had dodged any controversial policies, unlike his predecessor Joko “Jokowi” Widodo, whose approval rating in his first few months in office was dented by an unpopular move to increase the price of subsidised fuels in November 2014.
Indikator found Jokowi’s approval rating in his first few months in office stood at 62 per cent.
“So far, any controversial [statements that] Prabowo has made have not materialised into a concrete policy,” Burhanuddin said, citing an example of Prabowo’s suggestion late last year to roll back direct regional head elections to cut costs.
The results of the Indikator survey were generally similar to that of a poll released last week by Litbang Kompas, the research arm of Kompas daily, which found that Prabowo enjoyed 80.9 per cent job approval, largely on the back of populist policies.
Presidential Communication Office (PCO) spokesperson Philips J. Vermonte described the results of the Indikator survey as “good news” even though the government did not formally use a 100-day mark but rather a five-year time frame to evaluate its programmes.
“If we look at Prabowo’s eight-point campaign promise, Asta Cita, most of them are multi-year, structural programmes that are intended to achieve their results [in the long run] and not just quick wins,” Philips said.
Prabowo has pledged to have his free meal programme cover tens of millions of schoolchildren and pregnant women in the country by the end of his administration in 2029.
The programme has so far covered 650,000 schoolchildren in scores of regencies across the country, according to Philips. - The Jakarta Post/ANN