Budiarti Utami Putri, Jakarta – The head of the Indonesian Institute of Sciences' (LIPI) research center, Firman Noor, revealed the ever-strengthening political oligarchy in Indonesia stemmed from two factors.

He said it could be traced to economic disparities where only 0.0000000002 percent of society controlled Indonesia's 10 percent gross domestic product (GDP), and secondly, inheritance of the country's New Order economic-political system that created policies far from the people's interests.

"So whoever wins, we will never feel the difference because it gets taken over by them," said Firman to Tempo in Central Jakarta on Thursday.

In terms of the presidential candidates for the upcoming Indonesia election, he said both Jokowi-Ma'ruf Amin and Prabowo-Sandiaga Uno tickets had yet to offer any clear strategies to end political oligarchy, even after asking the question to representatives of both presidential candidates.

Furthermore, the LIPI researcher said it was essential that whoever rose to power should eliminate political oligarchy. Otherwise, he said, Indonesia would continue to experience disparities and had its democracy "hijacked".

Source: https://en.tempo.co/read/1190422/lingering-political-oligarchy-leads-to-hijacked-democracy-lipi