JAKARTA - Indonesian President Prabowo Subianto marked two years in office on Tuesday, but many Indonesians remain dissatisfied with his performance as they do not feel the benefits of the country's steady growth of around 5 percent.
Soaring prices have hit households and informal jobs with less security account for about 60 percent of employment. Meanwhile, Prabowo's flagship policy, a free school meal program aimed at providing meals to over 80 million students, is straining the state budget.
As public dissatisfaction grows, his approval rating has stagnated at about 45 percent, sharply down from some 81 percent last November.
Aliah, 61, who runs a restaurant on the outskirts of Jakarta, said her sales have nearly halved over the past two years.
"Life is tough, and everyone is trying to save money," she said, adding that although ingredient costs have soared, she cannot raise prices for fear of losing even more customers.
Muhammad Daerobi, a 46-year-old motorcycle taxi driver, also faces declining earnings. He works from 7 a.m. to midnight with only brief breaks but revealed, "Food and education expenses are higher than my income."
Under the Prabowo administration, the unemployment rate has been trending downward, standing at about 4.7 percent as of May of this year.
But according to the World Bank, there are not enough well-paying jobs necessary for the middle class to expand. The median real wage, adjusted for inflation, has decreased by about 0.5 percent annually.
Due to rising crude oil prices stemming from the Middle East situation and other factors, the country's inflation rate stood at about 3.3 percent year-on-year in September.
The government plans to keep the prices of subsidized fuels unchanged until the end of this year, but any price hike would deal a further blow to household finances.
Amid a lack of tangible improvements in living standards, Prabowo's flagship policies are eroding fiscal capacity. The free school meal program, launched in January, accounted for about 9 percent of the state budget in the initial budget for this fiscal year.
In addition, approximately 50,000 people had suffered food poisoning by early September due to inadequate hygiene management, leading to protests across the country calling for the suspension of the program.
To promote economic growth in rural areas, the "Red and White Village Cooperative," a network of food retail and logistics hubs, was launched at approximately 80,000 locations nationwide in July of last year. The construction of facilities is proceeding in various regions.
The Center of Economic and Law Studies, a think tank focused on economy and public policy, recently released a report on the two years of the Prabowo administration, saying 76 percent of respondents called for suspending the school lunch program and 66 percent opposed the cooperatives program.
A total of 53 percent felt that "economic conditions have worsened compared to last year," and many cited measures to control inflation and the creation and protection of jobs as necessary policies.
In October, the Finance Ministry ordered ministries and government agencies to reduce official travel costs by 30 percent.
Aliah hopes that "the government will focus on policies that make life easier."
