PKS Rejects The Use Of The State Budget For The Jakarta-Bandung High Speed Train, Jazuli: Reckless!

Illustration (Photo: Doc. Antara)

JAKARTA - The Prosperous Justice Party (PKS) of the DPR RI ordered all faction members in the DPR to reject the use of the State Revenue and Expenditure Budget (APBN) for the Jakarta-Bandung high-speed rail project. seems reckless because it will be more difficult to burden the people and harm the country as a whole," said Chairman of the PKS Faction of the DPR RI, Jazuli Juwaini in a statement, Thursday, October 14. According to him, since the beginning, the high-speed train project has caused a polemic and has even been judged to be flawed by some parties. "The government should have considered this, why is it borne by the state budget?," he said surprised. Apart from rejecting the fast train, the PKS faction also urged infrastructure projects, including projects that have the potential to stall, to be thoroughly evaluated.

"The PKS faction rejects all forms of infrastructure projects that have no urgency," said Jazuli. PKS also highlighted the government's insistent plan to move the new capital city from Jakarta to East Kalimantan. Because according to him, this project will have the same fate and fix the state budget on a large scale.

"We are naturally worried that the State Capital (IKN) project could suffer the same fate and will burden the state budget on a large scale," said Jazuli.

State Budget Disbursement Unfavorable Signal for Investors?

Previously, BUMN observer from the University of Indonesia (UI) Toto Pranoto gave his views regarding the government's decision to provide an injection of capital for the completion of the construction of the Jakarta-Bandung high-speed train. According to Toto, this effort is a form of initiative so that the work can be completed on time.

"I think the state has finally decided to provide additional PNM (state capital participation) to PT KAI as the lead consortium so that the work on this project can be completed on time in 2022," he said.

Toto added that this project has different characteristics from several other infrastructure projects. He also disagrees with the notion that the government's capital injection indicates that this project is less attractive to investors.

“This is an infrastructure project, so the investment model is long term. So, we need investor models who also have a long term horizon for their investment,” he said.

Furthermore, the professional, who is also listed as an academic, also explained that investors who enter the Jakarta-Bandung high-speed train have certainly taken into account all the positive aspects and risks that will follow in the future.

"If we get investors who are interested and agree that they will enter this project, of course on the basis of a mature calculation that this project will be economically visible to work on," he said.