JAKARTA - President Prabowo Subianto alluded to Indonesia's failure to reach the World Cup when talking about the importance of looking at problems based on facts. He compared Indonesia to Cape Verde, a country with a much smaller population that was able to qualify.
Prabowo made the statement when he received the Head of the National Research and Innovation Agency, Arif Satria, and BRIN researchers at the Presidential Palace Complex, Thursday, August 6.
Prabowo said Indonesia has a population of almost 300 million people. However, such a large country has not been able to enter the World Cup.
"I am very sad, frankly, we are not able to enter the World Cup just for football problems," said Prabowo.
He then alluded to Cape Verde. According to Prabowo, the number of residents in that country is even smaller than Sumedang Regency.
"When a small country like Cape Verde entered? I don't know, maybe the population is more than Sumedang Regency," he said.
Prabowo then alluded to the Minister of Youth and Sports who is also the Chairman of the PSSI Erick Thohir. He assessed that efforts in national football had been made, but the strategy might still need to be improved.
"He has fought incredibly. We almost got in, maybe his strategy should have been smarter," said Prabowo.
Prabowo emphasized that the comparison was not an excuse to complain or find a party to blame. He asked for the causes of the failure to be sought openly.
"Don't complain, don't look for a scapegoat. Now learn how, why can the country get in," he said.
He asked for various factors to be studied, including the origin of the coach, coaching patterns, and strategies used by other countries.
According to Prabowo, a similar approach must also be used in the issue of development. Problems must be read with facts, then find the causes and solutions.
"Sometimes the facts are not nice. Sometimes seeing the reality is not nice," he said.
Prabowo said Indonesia has many smart people. However, they must be sought, trained, given opportunities, and supported through a clear process.
The English, Chinese, Japanese, Arabic, and French versions are automatically generated by the AI. So there may still be inaccuracies in translating, please always see Indonesian as our main language. (system supported by DigitalSiber.id)
