BUMN Denies Profiting From Gotong Royong Vaccination Program

COVID-19 VACCINATION (EAST JAVA PROVINCIAL GOVERNMENT)

JAKARTA - The gotong royong or independent vaccination program has started to run. However, this program is considered unfair for small and medium-sized entrepreneurs because the costs that must be incurred are quite expensive.

In addition, the use of a single vaccine from Sinopharm gave the impression of the business motives behind the program.

Special Staff of the Minister of SOEs Arya Sinulingga responded to the allegations of business motives behind the gotong royong vaccination program. He denied the Ministry of SOEs was looking for profit by using certain brands of vaccines.

Arya said the government is not only using one brand of vaccine in the gotong royong vaccination program. According to him, in addition to the Sinopharm and Cansino vaccines that have now obtained permission to use, it is also exploring the possibility of importing vaccines from Russia, namely Sputnik V.

"Innately suspicious continues yes, this is not only Sinopharm. We also open the opportunity that the name Sputnik from Russia, again the process, we are still waiting," he said in a virtual discussion, Friday, May 21.

Arya made sure the government was open about the COVID-19 vaccine brand. Therefore, Arya denied the government was only fixated on one brand of vaccine.

"There are several alternative vaccines that are again proposed by friends, again processed. So if it is said that these are steps to find profit then only one brand, enggak. We're looking for something else, not just this," he explained.

Related to the price of COVID-19 vaccine in the gotong royong vaccination program which is considered expensive, Arya said the government is already trying to get a vaccine at a low price. The price set is the best effort of the government in the procurement of vaccinations.

"So if it is said to accelerate (national vaccination) make it cheap, just look for the vaccine aja difficult. It also wants to be cheap, but it can be that way," he said.

The previous government set a price of Rp321,660 per dose and a maximum tariff of vaccination services worth Rp117,910 per one-time injection of vaccines. While one person needs two doses, so the price to be paid is Rp879,140.

Previously, SOE Minister Erick Thohir said the pricing of gotong royong vaccine has been done transparently, even in audits by the Financial and Development Supervisory Agency (BPKP). Although the procurement of vaccines is carried out by pharmaceutical SOEs, PT Bio Farma (Persero), Erick insists the government is not looking to profit from the gotong royong vaccination program.

"Since our inception state-owned enterprises are very open, we do not think for the commercialization of this vaccine. But the reality that we have to face that this vaccine should be bought and not a vaccine obtained for free," he said.

The former Inter Milan boss said the government spends Rp77 trillion a year on the COVID-19 vaccination program. According to Erick, the amount of budget prepared by the Indonesian government is the largest in the world.

Erick Thohir said the budget is needed to pursue vaccination targets for up to 70 percent of the population. He guaranteed that there was no commercialization by the government in the distribution of this vaccine.

"So do not look at the context of the government present looking for margins or profits in the distribution of vaccines and this I think the world's largest Rp77 trillion," he said.