Ministries And Institutions Ask For Additional Budget, Economists Call It Will Burden The State Budget

Illustration (Photo: Doc. ANTARA)

JAKARTA - Director of the Digital Economy Center of Economic and Law Studies (Celios) Nailul Huda said there were several increases in the Indicative Ceiling for all Ministries/Institutions (K/L).

However, there are also several ministries whose budgets have been reduced.

"I see that the reduced indicative ceiling is intended to increase government spending related to special programs that I don't think will be sufficient to be financed only from state revenues," he explained to VOI, Thursday, June 13.

Huda said that the Minister of Finance often said that next year, the economy will be increasingly uncertain and will greatly affect state revenues.

Therefore, the tax ratio in 2024 and 2025 is down on target.

In addition, Huda conveyed that the State Budget (APBN) was also burdened with a fairly high burden for elected government programs such as free nutritious meals, and the burden of IKN development and other PSN.

"So the government must save and choose to cut the K/L budget which is not very important," he said.

On the other hand, Huda sees that the House of Representatives (DPR) at the end of this period will not insist too much on budgeting, because some members will be replaced.

"So I think from the side of the members of the DPR itself, it's like a loss to the K/L budget," he said.

Therefore, Huda said that K/L received fresh air from the Ministry of Finance and the Coordinating Ministry for Maritime Affairs and Investment in Indonesia to be able to expand the budget deficit to 2.5 percent to 2.8 percent of GDP.

According to him, debt financing will be learned if the budget is increased, even without being able to explain what the additional program is for.

"For example, the Ministry of Education and Culture asked for an additional budget because yesterday said the budget was still relatively small, even though what they were incompetent in managing the budget was not the small budget. Likewise with other agencies," he said.

According to Huda, if there is an additional budget for each K / L, the deficit will automatically widen, so that there will be a real threat, namely that the government has a contest that will violate the State Financial Law.