Ministry Of Finance Often Becomes A Black Goat, Purbaya Says He Doesn't Want To Be Blamed

JAKARTA - Minister of Finance Purbaya Yudhi Sadive said that his meeting with President Prabowo Subianto in Hambalang was part of efforts to accelerate the implementation of various government programs, especially programs that still encountered obstacles or had not run optimally.

The meeting took place on Thursday, September 18, Purbaya emphasized that the results of the meeting could not all be published because they were still in the early stages of discussion.

However, he revealed that one of the issues discussed was the issue in Agrinas.

"What is clear (the meeting in Hambalang) is the acceleration requested by the President, if there are programs that are a bit disturbing. For example, there was a complaint to me yesterday. Agrinas has a program of how many thousand hectares of land has not been certified by the HGU (business rights)," he told the media crew in Media Briefing, Friday, September 19.

Purbaya explained that to obtain the HGU, Agrinas needed a letter from the Ministry of Finance stating that the land was free from the obligation to receive Non-Tax State (PNBP).

He added that the company complained to the President because it felt that their application letter had not been processed.

"For HGU, he needs a letter from the Ministry of Finance stating that PNBP is free, he complains to the President, sir, we have sent a letter to the Ministry of Finance, but it has not been processed," he said.

Responding to this, Purbaya emphasized that he did not remain silent and instead conveyed directly to the President that the letter from Agrinas had just been sent in the afternoon and would be followed up immediately.

"I don't know shame. I told the President, Mr. President, I just sent it this afternoon. Yes, tomorrow I will issue (PNBP's free statement). Today I will issue it, but you Agrinas don't claim I'm late, so we will speed it up again," he explained.

Purbaya admitted that he was not happy if the Ministry of Finance was constantly used as the party to blame in the bureaucratic process and said that his ministry was often used as a scapegoat if there was a program that did not go as expected.

"Usually, he said that the Ministry of Finance was a scapegoat, right, samsack, he was always blamed," he said.

Therefore, he stated that he would be more proactive in the future and one of the steps that would be taken was to visit directly the ministries and institutions (K/L) which have a large budget that has strategic programs but is slow in absorption.

Purbaya menyampaikan akan mengevaluasi dan menyisir program-program tersebut untuk melihat di mana pihaknya dapat membantu percepatan penyerapan anggaran.

"Kita akan sisir kalau kita bisa bantu penyerapan angkanya, kita bantu dan kita antisipasi nanti di akhir Oktober kita hitung bisa serap apa nggak kalau nggak ya kita ambil uangnya, kita redistribusi ke tempat, ke program yang lebih bagus, yang siap, atau yang untuk masyarakat langsung," tegasnya.

Purbaya said that he would evaluate and comb through these programs to see where his party could help accelerate budget absorption.

"We will comb if we can help absorb the numbers, we will help and we anticipate that later at the end of October we can calculate whether or not we can absorb the money, we will redistribute it to a place, to a better program, which is ready, or for the community directly," he said.