By Resty Woro Yuniar

Copyright scmp

Six years after Nusantara was unveiled as Indonesia’s future capital and a symbol of national transformation, President Prabowo Subianto has redefined its purpose, prompting debate over the fate of the megaproject and the legacy of his predecessor.
Under a presidential regulation Prabowo signed in late June, but made public only in September, Nusantara has been reclassified as Indonesia’s “political capital” – a phrase absent from existing legislation.
The regulation, which outlines development targets over the coming years, commits to “support the realisation of Nusantara as the political capital in 2028”.
Is ‘political capital’ the same as the national capital?
Muhammad Khozin, Indonesian legislator
According to Basuki Hadimuljono, head of the Nusantara Capital City Authority, the move is intended as reassurance.
“This regulation is expected to provide certainty for the public, business actors and investors so that they do not doubt the continuation and completion of the development of the new capital, which is currently still under way,” he said in a statement on September 26.
But for many Indonesian legal scholars and politicians, the new designation has only deepened the uncertainty. Is Nusantara’s future being protected, diluted or simply repackaged for political convenience?

A vision reimagined
When then president Joko Widodo announced the capital’s relocation from Jakarta to East Kalimantan province in 2019, the rationale was both practical and visionary.
The Greater Jakarta metropolitan area, home to more than 30 million people, is sinking, choked by pollution and beset by floods. Nusantara would not only relieve these pressures but also provide a nation-building project for a new era, spreading wealth and development beyond Java, Indonesia’s most populous island.
Widodo envisioned a model of smart, green urbanism, with a presidential palace, legislative chambers, homes for thousands of civil servants and infrastructure for millions of future residents.
But the recent “political capital” label, which was not defined in the 2023 law that underpins the move, has sown confusion.

“The new nomenclature assigned to Nusantara ultimately raises fundamental questions about the future and sustainability of the capital,” Muhammad Khozin, a legislator from the National Awakening Party, wrote in a commentary for local news outlet Kompas late last month.
“Is ‘political capital’ the same as the national capital? Does the political capital only function for day-to-day governance and administrative functions?”
Herdiansyah Hamzah, a constitutional law lecturer at Mulawarman University in East Kalimantan, likened it to Malaysia’s bifurcated capital.
“Just like in Malaysia, there are Putrajaya and Kuala Lumpur. Kuala Lumpur remains the business centre, while Putrajaya is the seat of government,” he told This Week in Asia.

For Herdiansyah, the change signals a “political compromise”. When Prabowo ran for election last year, “he promised that the Nusantara project would remain in place” because Widodo had supported him, he said.
Prabowo would not want to be seen “abandoning Jokowi’s legacy so openly, even though he does not care for it”m Herdiansyah added, referring to Widodo by his popular nickname.
On the day the new regulation was made public, Widodo publicly called for his supporters to back his son, Vice-President Gibran Rakabuming Raka, and Prabowo in the 2029 presidential election, highlighting how closely the capital’s fate is linked to personal and political legacies.
Djohermansyah Djohan, a professor of government science at the Institute of Domestic Government in Indonesia, described Nusantara’s rebranding as “a mere political statement … solely to demonstrate that the development is moving forward, not stalled”.

He called relocating the centre of government to Nusantara by 2028 “ambitious”, as the current state budget was already under pressure to finance Prabowo’s priority programmes.
From the government’s perspective, the redefinition is pragmatic. “If Nusantara is to function as a centre of government, as a capital city, then the three institutions that are the pillars of the state, which are executive, legislative and judicial, must have facilities there,” Muhammad Qodari, head of the presidential staff office, said on September 22.
Yet Herdiansyah cautions that the new regulation alone cannot guarantee Nusantara’s future. “It is very difficult for Prabowo to choose to continue Jokowi’s legacy because he has political promises, such as his free nutritious meals programme, that require a massive budget,” he said.
Prasetyo Hadi, minister of the state secretariat, said in October last year that Prabowo would sign the crucial presidential decree on capital relocation “once everything is ready” in Nusantara.

Ambition vs reality
By 2028, officials in charge of the new capital aim to have developed 850 hectares (2,100 acres) for the core government area, completed at least 20 per cent of the office buildings in Nusantara and finished half the infrastructure required to support up to 4,100 civil servants.
Prabowo previously said he hoped to relocate as many as 9,500 civil servants to the city by 2029.
Modest progress has been made towards this goal. As of September, 44 residential buildings had been finished, with construction of a vice-presidential palace, a state mosque and a toll road to Balikpapan, East Kalimantan’s second city, expected by year’s end.
Nusantara’s first phase, completed last year, delivered the Garuda presidential palace, government offices, ministerial residences and an exclusive airport for dignitaries.

Funding is another matter, however. Prabowo’s administration has earmarked just 6.5 trillion rupiah (US$390 million) for Nusantara in 2026, half the planned funding for this year.
The president has pledged a total of 48.8 trillion rupiah through 2029, but this pales against the 335 trillion rupiah (US$20 billion) budgeted for his flagship free meals programme in 2026 alone.
From 2022 to 2024, 75.8 trillion rupiah was spent on Nusantara, all sourced from the state budget. To date, 49 private investors have poured 65.3 trillion rupiah into the project, according to the capital city authority.
Whether Nusantara emerges as a living symbol of national renewal or a monument to compromise may depend less on regulations and more on the will to finish what was so grandly begun.
As the cranes keep working, the forest capital’s fate is being shaped by the unresolved question of what kind of city Indonesia wants at its heart.