Chairman Of The PAN Expert Council Drajad Wibowo Tepis Assuming Zulhas Is Riding The Government's Migor Program For Child Promotion, Said Didu Alludes To PDIP-PSI

Minister of Trade (Mendag) Zulkifli Hasan distributes Oilkita to the public. ANTARA/Personal Documentation

JAKARTA - Chairman of the PAN Expert Council Dradjad Wibowo dismissed the assumption that the Minister of Trade (Mendag) Zulkifli Hasan or Zulhas used government programs to promote his daughter.

"Bang Zul is present as the Chairman of PAN, not as the Minister of Trade. The event is held on weekends, not weekdays. The Trade Minister is used to working outside working hours. However, if you occasionally use weekends for your family or PAN, you shouldn't," he said in a statement. information reported by ANTARA, Friday, July 15.

Dradjad explained that Zulhas' presence at the event was part of a series of "Cheap PANsar" activities that were funded by PAN administrators and cadres. Sharing activities with the people are often carried out by PAN cadres.

One of these sharing activities was carried out by DPR member from PAN Eko Patrio who held Cheap PANsar in six places in DKI Jakarta last April.

"Sembako with a price of Rp. 150 thousand is sold for only Rp. 30 thousand. The subsidy is Rp. 120 thousand," he said.

He confirmed that Zulkifli Hasan's statement was as the chairman of PAN, not as the Minister of Trade. The head of the political party, he said, could certainly ask for the people's support.

"If the comments are related to election violations, the campaign period hasn't started yet, are politicians not allowed to stay in touch with their constituents," he said.

Dradjad hopes that the public will not be swayed by the twisting issue about Trade Minister Zulhas using the government program to get the people to vote for his daughter.

"The Minister of Trade uses government programs so that the people choose their daughters. This issue was raised because the food import players and their backing elements are getting hot," said Dradjad.

Meanwhile, former Secretary of the Ministry of SOEs Muhammad Said Didu considered that the warning was unfair only for the Minister of Trade Zulhas.

Because, according to him, apart from Zulhas, there are also ministers who are campaigning for themselves and their families. Said Didu said this in his personal Twitter account today.

It is known that the distribution of cheap cooking oil was also carried out by the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI) and the Indonesian Solidarity Party (PSI) in March 2022.

In fact, the PDI-P at that time distributed cooking oil of up to 10 tons. Meanwhile, PSI also held a low-cost market operation at that time in the midst of the shortage of cooking oil that occurred.

In addition to the two political parties, the Democratic Party through its vice president, Edhie Baskoro Yudhoyono or Ibas, has been in the spotlight for distributing 16,000 cooking oil at low prices when there are crowds and rumors of hoarding.

Not only PDI-P, PSI, and Democrats, a number of parties, such as Golkar in the regions, also had time to conduct cheap market activities and distribute and distribute cooking oil at low prices.

Likewise with PKS, as much as 9,000 liters of bulk cooking oil is sold according to the highest retail price (HET) in its market operations. The market operation is to ease the burden on the community as well as market intervention in line with the still high price of cooking oil.