Beginning his career as a political outsider, the President has demonstrated his ability to navigate the nation's elitist politics and score policy points time and again, proving his detractors wrong while disappointing some supporters that expected more.

A recent act of police brutality against a protester in Tangerang regency, Banten, has further motivated calls for police reform amid declining public sentiment toward the institution.

Concerns grow over the politicization of Indonesia's overarching research agency. 

His latest appointment by President Jokowi to helm a new committee that will be in charge of the Jakarta-Bandung railway project, taking over the role that had been occupied by Coordinating Economic Minister Airlangga Hartarto, is further proof of his reputation for getting things done.

Police officials have scrambled to counter the viral hashtag #PercumaLaporPolisi (no use going to the police) that has sent the law enforcement institution into one of its worst PR crises in recent years.

The ministerial position held by Tito is very strategic, analysts say.

The House of Representatives delayed again on Wednesday a deliberation on the 2024 election schedule, as the home minister failed to attend the meeting and House factions remained divided.

Saiful Mahdi, a lecturer from Aceh province, was imprisoned for three months over comments made in a WhatsApp messenger group chat among fellow academics, which criticised a hiring process for lecturers.

The revival of the Labor Party marks another shift in Indonesian labor politics.

Megawati will again face a tough choice: whether to pave the way for another political “outsider” to help the party win the election or to push for her political heir to maintain the Sukarno dynasty’s stranglehold on the party.

In a plenary session on Thursday, the House of Representatives inaugurated the new Deputy House Speaker, Lodewijk Paulus, to replace fellow Golkar Party politician and graft suspect Azis Syamsuddin.

Fifty-seven KPK staff were fired after being told they had failed a civil service exam, the results of which they said have been withheld. The Ombudsman and human rights commission suspected maladministration and the KPK has defended the exam.

House of Representatives Deputy Speaker Sufmi Dasco Ahmad confirmed on Thursday that the House leadership had obtained the presidential letter confirming the handover of the new capital city bill and that legislators will start work on it once they return from recess in November.

The removed statues were of military figures Lieut. Gen. Sarwo Edhie Wibowo, Gen. AH Nasution, and Maj. Gen. and former president Soeharto.

Critics are wary of the potential for an increased military and police presence in national politics, especially as military involvement in state affairs was a core element of former president Soeharto’s authoritarian New Order regime.

House of Representatives deputy speaker Azis Syamsuddin from Golkar Party cited being in home isolation after having been in close contact with a person infected with coronavirus as a reason to request a postponement of a Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK) summons.

Asfinawati, chairman of the Indonesian Legal Aid Foundation (YLBHI), said public officials should be fair game for criticism.

The 2024 general election remains mired in uncertainty, with the government proposing to move the presidential and legislative elections closer to the regional elections, sparking concerns about overlapping cycles and a heavier workload on organizers, thus undermining the quality and fairness of the elections.

Indonesia’s Permanent Mission to the UN in Geneva claimed the warning was a “mischaracterization” and accused the UN expert of taking a “megaphone approach […] just for the sake of personal gain through media exposure”.

The survey shows that 63 percent of respondents agreed that the government should be able to constrain civil liberties during the pandemic — higher than 43 percent in Malaysia, 39 percent in the Philippines, 59 percent in Singapore and 49 percent in Thailand.

“The 2024 elections cannot be postponed according to the Constitution. That being said, what if the pandemic crisis still drags on. Nothing is certain,” said National Awakening Party (PKB) deputy chairman Jazilul Fawaid.

Announced last month, the star-studded line-up at the Indonesian Chamber of Commerce and Industry (Kadin) is now seen as a strategic move by President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo to realize his ambitious plans, analysts say.

Indonesia has a weak cyber security record, with poor online literacy and frequent leaks previously.

With PAN officially joining the ruling coalition, Jokowi has now secured the support of 82 percent of members of the House of Representatives, leaving only the Democratic Party and the Prosperous Justice Party (PKS) as the opposition.

The PAN chairman has said that the latest party to join the ruling coalition aims to bring the government and the country’s Muslim community closer together, while underlining that the party is based on Pancasila and dissing observations that the administration was deliberately distancing itself from Islam.

With its intelligent insights, ideas and research, academia and the think tank crowd both acknowledge the role that the Centre for Strategic and International Studies has played in shaping both Indonesia’s history and future.

The idea for the Centre for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) originated in the discussions and activities of several groups of Indonesian scholars, including students who graduated abroad and activists based in Indonesia in the 1960s, serving as a forum for intellectuals who would bear witness to and go on to shape the country’s fledgling democracy in the early 21st century.

Installing roadside billboards to promote their profiles appears not to have brought any significant boost in electability for Golkar Party chairman Airlangga Hartarto and Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P) politician Puan Maharani.

President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo’s approval rating has dropped to below 60 percent as public discontent grows over the prolonged social-restrictions policy he has implemented to contain the deadly Delta-induced second wave of COVID-19 in June.

Neither the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P) nor the Gerindra Party are in any rush to push the controversial plan to amend the 1945 Constitution, both parties’ secretary generals asserted on Tuesday, amid reports that scenarios to extend a presidential tenure are in play.