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It was supposed to represent the defining legacy of Joko Widodo’s decade-long presidency. Nusantara, the future capital of Indonesia, is being built in the jungle of BorneoWe are still a few weeks away from the planned opening and construction is still ongoing.Let it be” ” said Mr Widodo, who arrived at the site earlier this week to take stock of the apparent delays:This is a 10, 15 or 20-year job. Not just one, two or three years.. »
AFP’s recent visit to Nusantara showed unfinished buildings and bumpy roads, in addition to the wing-shaped presidential palace inspired by the mythical bird Garuda, amid dust kicked up by trucks and excavators. Nusantara is due to be inaugurated on August 17, Indonesia’s Independence Day, but construction delays, funding problems and officials’ reluctance to move there have raised doubts about whether it can effectively become the new capital. A decree formally transferring capital status from Jakarta to Nusantara has not yet been issued and can only be issued after Prabowo Subianto, the winner of February’s presidential election, takes office in October.
The tower remains empty and unfinished
Jakarta, a metropolis of 12 million inhabitants, is crumbling under car traffic and pollution and threatened by rising water levels. That’s why Joko Widodo, nicknamed “Jokowi,” has revived a long-abandoned project to move the capital. The goal: to rebalance development across a vast archipelago of 17,500 islands, which has so far been concentrated on Java. The site chosen was on the east coast of the island of Borneo, 1,200 kilometers northeast of Jakarta and two hours by plane. According to preliminary plans, it will be built in five phases by 2045, with the first to go into operation this summer. “We are on the right track. As you can see, there is no crisis.“We are ensuring that the first phase is 80 percent complete,” Nusantara infrastructure manager Danis Sumadilaga told AFP at the site.But… this is the first step in a long-term development. This is not about today. This is for our next generation.“, he added.
Another manager close to the project, who spoke on condition of anonymity, told a different story that the first phase was close to 20% complete. Across the city, large numbers of workers were working around the empty towers, forced to stick to the August 17 delivery date.We are under pressure to achieve our Independence Day goals.Jamaludin, a 47-year-old concrete factory manager, admitted that like many Indonesians he has only one name.Extreme weather conditions”, added 37-year-old worker Nisya Khairunnisa, after persistent rains at the construction site in recent weeks. The city chief and his deputy resigned in June due to the delays.
Civil servants are reluctant to move
Added to this is the difficulty of attracting significant foreign investment. Jakarta will finance 20% of the new city, but needs 100 trillion rupiah (5.6 billion euros) in private investment by the end of 2024. By the end of June, only 513,000 billion rupiah (2.9 billion euros) had been raised from state donors. Experts say foreign companies are reluctant to invest in a city located in one of the world’s largest rainforests, home to orangutans and proboscis monkeys.They don’t want to invest in projects that harm biodiversity“, explains Aida Greenbury, an Indonesian sustainable development expert. For Nicky Fahrizal of the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Jakarta, “This is an impossible task. The national finances do not allow a giant building to be built in one or two years.».
The project’s progress has not encouraged about 10,000 civil servants to settle in Nusantara from September next year.”Obviously the facilities are not perfect.», the judge is a civil servant in his thirties who, like others, agreed to speak to AFP on condition of anonymity.We are told that it will actually become a city by 2045. But we have to settle there in 2024. What will our lives be like by then?Even the promise of special bonuses and moving expenses did not change their minds.I’m still hesitant about moving.», confides another 32-year-old civil servant. But the government counts on the loyalty and sacrifice of its agents:Those who come will be pioneers” stressed Sofian Sibarani, the city’s architect.
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