Who is Prabowo? The man behind Indonesia’s big promises - Asia Specific podcast, BBC World Service

There's this great word that Jonathan will know as well, Gemoy, which you have a great description of the translation for that, Jonathan, right? Like it's to pinch... Cheek-pinchingly cute. It's the way Indonesians describe "Gemoy". Yeah yeah. Not how I would have ever thought we would be talking about Prabowo. Cute. You'd never have thought it would you? A free meal every day for 83 million people. It's a bold and ambitious lunch programme that's rolling out. across the world's fourth most populous country.

And its success, or setbacks will define the legacy. of Indonesia's leader, Prabowo Subianto. His country of 275 million people has long had huge potential, but has often fallen short of living up to it. Now he's trying to change that. But is his ambition to end malnutrition. and make Indonesia a fast growing powerhouse of Asia.

a recipe for success or failure? I'm Mariko in Singapore and this is Asia Specific from the BBC World Service. Twice a week we bring you Asia Pacific stories. unpacked by those who know them best. Well, today I have Jonathan Head, the BBC's South East Asia correspondent, and Karishma Vaswani, an Asia opinion columnist from Bloomberg. But for viewers and listeners who may not realize, Karishma used to work at the BBC, so we've known each other for 19 years.

But you and Jonathan have known each other for even longer. Yes. Tell me why. Yes. So I applied for an internship when I was in university in the UK, I applied for an internship in Jakarta, where Jonathan was the BBC correspondent at the time. This is 1997. I'm dating us, Jonathan, for all the viewers and listeners out there. And I wrote a letter to him, which my dad delivered. I don't know if you know this. Handwritten letter?

Handwritten letter, back in the day and I said I have seen you. on the BBC in the UK and university and I want to be a journalist. and you are everything that I believe a journalist should be. And I want to learn from you. And he very kindly, you know, took this mad letter. from from someone he didn't know at all. And I said, I spoke Indonesian, excuse me, I spoke Indonesian, and I had grown up in Indonesia. It was home for me, and I wanted to learn more about it and learn more about being a journalist. And he let me, you know, follow him around for a good month and a half.

It was a really exciting time as well, wasn't it, Jonathan? It was the Asian Financial Crisis, was just sort of kicking off or had kicked off. And I learned so much about the country I call home. But also for any wannabe journalists out there, write a handwritten letter. to Jonathan Head and you might get a chance to become Karishma Vaswani. Oh my goodness. What do you remember about that young Karishma, Jonathan? Yeah, it was. You know, you can't help. but be impressed when somebody who so badly wants to be a journalist.

I'm not sure I could have been a huge amount of help. The BBC operation then in Jakarta was very basic. We rented a shed in the back garden of the bureau. of the French News Agency, which was in a very old style. 1930s Dutch villa, and this shed was leaky. Every now and again it used to catch fire because the electrics were bad. We had a plague of mice at the time. I'd also adopted a rather worm eating kitten. We operate... It was a very, very threadbare operation.

There was me and an assistant. So Karishma was actually a huge help, particularly because she spoke Indonesian. That's very kind of you to say. I fed the cat most days. But yes. That was a really important job. But it was an exciting time. Also, we were in the middle of an enormous forest fires that had, you know, not really been in the news coverage before. and people becoming really aware of this problem of air pollution. So Indonesia, which in the past had been a pretty quiet story,

really kept itself to itself, was getting a lot of headlines. Let's talk about Indonesia. I know how passionately you feel about your home country, so I don't want to like, ruin our friendship or anything like that, but I've read that Indonesia has often been described as an invisible nation. You know, despite the fact that they're the fourth most populous country. in the world, the biggest economy in South East Asia, and yet it's not known for, you know, huge soft power, you know, people are not driving Indonesian cars,

using Indonesian apps and so on. Do you agree with that? I think it's a bit of an unfair, but sadly often true tag, right? Like there's that great cartoon from The Simpsons, which has Homer reading The Economist magazine. Look at me. I'm reading The Economist. Did you know Indonesia is at a crossroads? It is. And that's the headline you consistently see from. mainly Western media organisations talking about how Indonesia is always.

at this crossroads and not punching above its weight. And I think part of the reason for that is. that there are so many problems at home. You know, this is a massive country. It's South East Asia's largest economy, and there's enough in a day to keep politicians consumed with their own issues. And, you know, again, I think it would be unfair to say that. in the past, Indonesia hasn't had more of a soft power. It was the leader of the Non-Aligned movement, or certainly very influential during that. It's a very big part of Asean.

And I think under Joko Widodo, there was some attempts. to sort of bring that foreign policy aspect back into it. But Prabowo, the president, the current president, Prabowo Subianto, he does have real ambitions for the country. But I think he is consumed with domestic politics as well. I want to ask Jonathan about President Prabowo, because you've known him for a very long time, probably even longer than you've known Karishma.

Just about the same amount of time. I wouldn't say known him, but I certainly used to meet him back in my early days, and he was even then quite a formidable figure. What do you remember about him? I mean, you know, he's now kind of rebranded himself, I guess. He won the election and his, I guess, flagship programmme, is it fair to say, you know, he wants to feed 83 million people a day, free lunch to all the children, and yet it's not going as well as many had expected.

Well, I think the thing to remember about him is that he comes from a very illustrious family, but spent his formative years in exile in the late 1950s, 1960s. He actually came back to Indonesia after the fall. of the previous Sukarno regime, when Suharto came to power in the late 60s, not really speaking Indonesian very well. Very much an outsider. He's a very intelligent man. He's very sharp, sharp mind, but also a somewhat combustible personality. He loves to be decisive.

He's ambitious. He's outspoken. He's mercurial. So when I based myself in Jakarta, he was at that stage married to Suharto's daughter. He'd moved up very far socially. He was the commander of the elite special forces in the military, and he was a kind of the go-to man, partly because of his westernised outlook. You could speak to him Bahasa or English, he was comfortable in either, and.

you could get a very interesting perspective. But he was always known as, you know, a somewhat unpredictable man, a man who was definitely going places, who everyone expected to be a major player in the future. That, of course, all fell apart for him when Suharto fell from power. And in those chaotic events, there were riots. You know, students taking to the streets. Prabowo ended up being officially blamed.

And he was dishonourably discharged from the military. and sent into exile. Essentially, he went into exile in Jordan for two years. And at that stage in the late 1990s, it was easy to think that perhaps, you know, that was the end of him. But such is his ambition and drive. You know, he was back within a few years already pushing for the top job. And in a way, you know, I think many people thought it was inevitable. at some stage he'd probably get it. Yeah. I mean, I don't know if I thought that he would get it.

You know, Jonathan, like the number of times you. and I have covered Indonesian elections together. and each time he would get up on stage and sort of have that bluster. and rhetoric. And I always thought to myself, gosh, I'm really impressed with your desire to be president, but really like, give it up. Right? And you know. But he got it. He got it. 2024 you know. But I think a lot of that is down. to the fact that he completely reinvented himself. from the man that Jonathan was just talking about. You know, he went from that special forces commander in exile.

and then came back in this new incarnation, this new avatar of cute, cuddly grandfather and really popular. with young people in Indonesia, particularly on social media, on TikTok, you know, you have this image of him. sort of hugging cats being really cute. There's this great word that Jonathan will know as well, which you have a great description of the translation for that,

Jonathan, right? Like it's to pinch. Cheek-pinchingly cute is the way Indonesians describe "Gemoy". Yeah, yeah. Not how I would have ever thought we would be talking about Prabowo. Cute. You'd never have thought it would, you know. And he did that. He reinvented himself. And that is what appealed to one of the youngest populations in Asia. And, you know, you go up. I remember going up to people at these rallies. and sort of having to say to them, do you know the history behind him? Like, you know, this guy isn't necessarily a nice guy.

And they basically said, we don't care. We don't remember. Is it authoritarian nostalgia? Is it deliberate amnesia? Who knows. But it was also, I think, a sign of a country that wants to move on. The tragedy is that is this the man who's really going to help them move on? But he's still very, very popular, isn't he? Like, if you look at the, I mean maybe not as popular was when he was elected, but, you know, reading about how this free lunch programme that he's, I guess,

you know, that's a very kind of populist policy, isn't it? And the fact that it's not been going too well. with thousands of food poisoning cases and so on, and yet he still remains pretty popular for, you know, in comparison to other state leaders, Jonathan? I mean, I think you've got to qualify that a little bit. I mean, his profile is high. But I think at the same time, we did have these very serious protests in August and September, probably some of the biggest protests in the sort.

of post-Suharto era that were linked to the, well, it was linked basically to in a huge increase. in allowances for lawmakers at the same time. as budgets were being cut for local governments around the country, partly to fund the enormous cost of this school programme. I think what we've seen in the first year of Prabowo. is the enormous difficulty of translating. simple, populist promises that work very well in an election campaign.

and certainly helped to cement his popularity then. into practical policies that deliver the results that are promised. I want to ask you about this free lunch programme. I mean, firstly, why is he doing this, Karishima? Well, you know, there are really important, legitimate reasons to do this, right? Indonesia has one of the most tragic cases in terms of child stunting. I think the stats are something like one in five children are at risk of it. This is particularly true of the eastern provinces,

but it is a problem across the archipelago. So, you know, as a president who has come along. to say that he wants to have a legacy making kind of initiative. to help people, this is something that would make sense. The problem, as Jonathan has pointed out, is you can have this grand vision. and grand idea, very well intentioned, very well intentioned, I should say. But you know, that cliche: the path to hell is paved with good intentions. The execution of this is where it's lacking. And also the cost is eye watering, right? $10 billion this year is the estimate.

Compare that to the health budget, which I think is around $15 billion. Next year it's going to go up to $20 billion. Some stats I've read say. that over the next five years it's something like $45 billion. You know, the numbers just keep increasing. And Jonathan, in terms of I mean, this is a very ambitious programme, you know, usually this populist policy that got him elected... Why did they start rolling it out so quickly? I mean, you would think that they would probably spend a bit longer. implementing it. What's the problem here?

I think the time scales are geared partly by. I think it could be perhaps Prabowo's impatience, but also as that was the signature policy. You know, people want to see results. I think in a way they over promised during the election. And also, as we can see, you know, they've only managed to scale it up a little bit this year. They'll scale it up a bit next year. There are five years in an Indonesian presidency. I just think he wanted to get that part of his legacy going. The problems they've run into with this free meals programme,

I think, lay opened the problems of Prabowo style of leadership. This need to be decisive in his foreign policy has been quite impulsive. He's a foreign policy passionate president. in a way that his predecessor definitely wasn't. He's a man of the world. He's tried to form a bond with President Trump. He's been very active in getting Indonesia, pushing. for it to be a more active member of the BRICS, to join the BRICS movement. And yet that has flaws in it. because it's also personalised in case of foreign policy.

His foreign minister is a virtually invisible man. He's essentially a loyalist. It's been driven entirely by Prabowo. He's trying to drive the free meals policy. He's completely restructured Indonesia's state investment arm. into this huge so-called sovereign wealth fund called Danantara, which is run by people who are quite loyal to him as well. And all the resources of the state-owned enterprises are going into that. This is a very personalised style of leadership.

that probably requires too much of the attention span of. a not always very healthy man, well into his 70s. I remember you interviewing Jokowi a couple of times when you were still. at the BBC, and it's quite a very different style of leadership, isn't it? And I guess after a decade of Jokowi, you know, is this kind. of bold leadership what Indonesia needs to achieve what he wants to achieve? Yeah. So, you know, we trade in stereotypes a lot as journalists. because it's convenient shorthand. So I'm going to do that. But it is obviously more nuanced than this.

But Jokowi was seen as this sort of Javanese king. And if I was to use the same metaphor for Prabowo, I think, as Jonathan has rightly pointed out, he's a much more of a sort. of Louis XVI kind of king, you know, full of bluster and rhetoric. But it's a very top down approach to leadership, where he keeps a coterie of people who just tell him what he wants to hear. And the issue with that is you don't actually find out what's going wrong on the ground.

And as a result, these policies then don't get executed. in the way that perhaps the leader wants. Now, in terms of getting Indonesia to, you know, these ambitious targets that he has, the other one that he has, which is completely unrealistic by every and sort of analysts estimate. that I've heard is the 8% growth target for the country. It sort of moves along at about 4% to 5% middling growth. It's not enough to create the jobs that you need for a country of that size. Is it useful in an era where you have, you know,

Trump as the superpower, in charge of the superpower of the world? It seems to at least buy him a little bit of rapport with Donald Trump. And at the same time, he's sort of managing the relationship with China. You know, to some extent, he's balancing both. I don't think it's going to get Indonesia to the point where it needs to. in order to achieve some of those really important economic goals. What about him naming his former father-in-law Suharto a national hero?

Because, you know, you two were talking about protests that we saw. And yet, I mean, how you described Suharto, you would have thought some people might not have been happy. with Prabowo's decision to call him a national hero. And yet people didn't seem to, you know, take to the streets at least, Jonathan? Yeah. I think enough time has passed for him to be able to get away with that. And it was interesting when he did that national hero move. The thing about Indonesia is it has had a really extraordinary history.

I mean, it's the most unlikely country. It is literally the Dutch East Indies. There are so many islands forming one country. Most people thought it wouldn't succeed. It had a terrible kind of violent convulsion. When Suharto took power in the 1960s, something like half a million people killed. Massive repression. Then this sort of almost military enforced stability with development. And then this exciting period after the fall of Suharto, of reform, the expectations of democracy.

I think in many ways Indonesia is still trying to define itself. And I think in a way, Prabowo is trying to make his mark. by saying, right, let's put the past behind us. Now, you listen to my programme, my ambitions for the country's future. I think it is still a very unsettled future. And I think, you know, really, the jury is out on how successful Prabowo is going to be. And what was your reaction, Karishma? Because you grew up in Indonesia? I was really disappointed. I was really disappointed at the time.

when we didn't see the sort of what I expected to be a real sense. of indignation that Suharto was being named a national hero, notwithstanding the fact that, you know, a lot of people still see him. as the father of the nation, father of development, as Jonathan was saying, you know, he presided over these mass killings, but also, huge infrastructure projects, many. of the roads that we still travel down in Jakarta, Jonathan, you know, were built during that era that he was in charge of.

But I do think there is a degree of whitewashing that's taking place. in terms of the either deliberate. or involuntary amnesia amongst young people. That is another reason why Prabowo has managed to reinvent himself. in the way that he has. I think this is really dangerous. I do think one of the problems, though, is that, you know, like much of this region, Karishma, you know this, that behind the sort of elections and the sort of participation of voters, Indonesia is an oligarchy. There are enormously powerful business interests who coalesce.

around whichever president it is to formulate policies that they see. They'll say they're in the country's interests, but are always in their interests. And those are the realities of power. They're the realities of power here in Thailand, in the Philippines, in most of South East Asia. You know, this is really where power resides. in these business elites who know each other. And what happens in a when you have a democracy as opposed to. a purely authoritarian system is they trade places every now and again,

you know, they they shift around. They allow somebody else to be in power. I wonder whether, you know, perhaps the current young generation. in Indonesia have just become very aware that that's the reality. Despite the extraordinary achievement of overthrowing Suharto. with less violence than people thought and him going. And young people really played a role then, in fact, you know, most of the people who did really well under Suharto, the top tycoons kept their wealth and power,

and their families are still there in terms of that elite. Very little has changed in Indonesia between. the pre and post-Suharto periods. I think that is sadly a very depressing reality, and I'm sure that, you know, that must be. in the minds of so many people who look at the system. and think it's completely rigged against us, so why should we bother? Right. And I think that was the sort of frustration. that you saw even in the protests in August. I was struck by a lot of the reporting. at the time that talked about young people just feeling.

like it doesn't really matter if we go and loot and raid because, you know, everything is stacked against us in any case. I'd like to think that Indonesia can be different. But perhaps that's the naive optimist. in me hoping that things can be better in the future. But there are, you know, right now, when I look at the current crop of young politicians that are there, there's no one that stands out to me as somebody who might change things. in the way that the country really needs, and that is a sort of depressing reality.

We'll leave it there. Jonathan Head in Bangkok and Karishma Vaswani, thank you so much for joining me on Asia Specific. If you have any comments or questions on the story that we covered today. or any other topics from the Asia Pacific region, please do leave us a comment below or you can also email us at AsiaSpecific@bbc.co.uk. But for now, thank you so much for watching or listening. See you next time.