Jokowi After Two Years

President Joko Widodo is entering the third year of his rule with a much stronger political base and a better coordinated working team in his cabinet. These two factors would make his leadership and economic management more effective in pushing through his people-centered programs during the rest of his tenure until October 2019.

(Courtesy of Kumparan.com)

His seems to have learnt many lessons from his first year in office, which was ruin by much political noise and bickering within his own cabinet. The second cabinet reshuffle last July produced a better coordinated working team, especially with the appointment of Sri Mulyani Indrawati, formerly managing director in the World Bank, as the new finance minister at a time the fiscal conditions worsening rapidly.

All key social and economic indicators during the second year show improvement, though not strong as expected. Economic growth is slightly up at 5 percent from 4.79 percent. Even though the performance of his administration is still below expectations of the people who voted for him, the public seems to trust him as the president of the common people, due mainly to his impeccable integrity and his priority programs that are rooted in the greatest interest of the common people.

His stronger political foundation and more in-tune working team will enable him to speed up the implementation of more than a dozen reform package launched since last September to minimize excessive bureaucracy and speed up business licensing and the delivery of public services.

For example, the great success of the tax amnesty will significantly broaden the tax base and increase revenue for financing infrastructure. Which has been on top of Jokowi's program from the beginning. It would be extremely difficult to accelerate economic growth above 5 percent, if the infrastructure gap remain as it is now, because poor and inadequate makes the economy uncompetitive as a result of grossly inefficient logistics.

The remaining major piece of homework for Jokowi is to maintain policy consistency and predictability, which is vital for the efficient and effective implementation of policies and programs. The public sector will perform better when there is stability in macro and strategic policies, and funding of existing policies. This requires attention to the balance between short term and long-term issues.