Jokowi To Lampung Tomorrow Sees The Roads Are Badly Damaged, Reminds The Importance Of Infrastructure

JAKARTA - President Joko Widodo said he wanted to ensure the truth of the number of damaged roads in Lampung whose videos went viral in cyberspace, so he plans to make a working visit to the province tomorrow, Friday (5/5).

"I want to make sure, whether or not what is in the video. Whether what is in the media is true or not," Jokowi said as quoted by ANTARA, Thursday, May 4.

The President stated that the government is currently starting efforts to collect data on district/city roads and provincial roads that are badly damaged.

Jokowi believes that this happened because the Regional Revenue and Expenditure Budget (APBD) at the provincial and district/city levels was not allocated for infrastructure development.

"And that is very important. Once the road is damaged, especially the provincial road, it will interfere with the commodity, the mobility of people, the mobility of goods, the cost of logistics will increase," he said.

According to Jokowi, this can practically directly make provincial production commodities with damaged roads unable to compete with goods from other regions.

"This is what we have to know that all the infrastructure benefits are there," he said.

President Jokowi was previously scheduled to make a working visit to Lampung on Wednesday (3/5) yesterday, according to a statement from the Minister of Public Works and Public Housing Basuki Hadimuljono.

However, recently the schedule for the working visit was postponed to Friday (5/5) and Minister Basuki admitted that he did not know for sure the reason for the change in the schedule for the President's visit.

"I don't know. Maybe the schedule is for the President. Ask for the protocol at the palace, ed.)," said Basuki at the Jakarta Presidential Palace, Wednesday (3/5).

Basuki also had time to emphasize that there was no instant repair for damaged roads in Lampung and road hall officers under the Ministry of PUPR only conducted a survey to the location of the road that the President was planning to visit.

However, based on the monitoring of ANTARA journalists in Lampung on Thursday, a number of damaged points on Jalan Canal Ryacudu have been buried withicidal stones ahead of President Jokowi's planned arrival.