JakartaPost-Aug 24, 2025
President Prabowo Subianto has suggested that Daya Anagata Nusantara (Danantara) play a big role in his short-term plan to balance the budget, but critics say that runs counter to the state asset fund’s design. In his annual state budget address before the People’s Consultative Assembly (MPR) on Aug. 15, Prabowo promised to keep refining fiscal planning through to the end of his term to reach the narrowest deficit possible. “My hope is, my dream is, that someday, maybe in 2027 or 2028, I want to stand before this assembly, on this podium, to deliver that we managed to get a state budget with no deficit at all,” said the President. The concrete scenario laid out by the President to reach that goal includes US$50 billion in expected revenue generated from state-owned enterprises (SOEs), which Prabowo said will lead to a surplus in the state budget. The number was based on what he suggested was a modest “return on assets” (ROA), noting that 12 percent ROA was deemed good in business and 10 percent was “conservative”. Assuming that, “say, for the Indonesian people, 5 percent is enough”, the former general continued, then the aggregated $1 trillion in assets of the SOEs, all managed by Danantara, would yield $50 billion. Asked by reporters on Tuesday whether Danantara would ever be ready to meet such expected payouts, Danantara CEO Rosan Roeslani replied: “Whatever it is, we will try as best we can with the existing investments, existing assets and existing equity”. “The point is, we have to be ready to execute existing programs of Danantara,” said Rosan, who also serves as investment minister. Mukhamad Misbakhun, a lawmaker from the Golkar Party, which is part of the ruling coalition, was standing next to Rosan when the CEO gave that answer, but he provided a different interpretation of Prabowo’s remarks. Misbakhun suggested that, what Prabowo had been referring to with the $50 billion figure was not direct state revenue but the spillover effect Danantara’s investments are hoped to produce. “They’re two different things; they can’t be mixed”. Read more at: https://www.thejakartapost.com/business/2025/08/24/prabowo-banks-on-danantara-to-balance-budget.html.
