Central Gov’t to Help Road Repairs in Lampung

President Jokowi delivers a press statement in Lampung, Friday (05/05). (Photo by: Bureau of Press, Media, and Information of Presidential Secretariat)

Central government through Ministry of Public Works and Public Housing (PUPR) will immediately repair several damaged roads in Lampung. President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo made the statement after inspecting some damaged roads in Lampung, Friday (05/05).

“Our spirit is that we want to repair the damaged roads that we saw earlier, be it regency roads, provincial roads, or city roads that are in bad shape,” the President said at the road side of Seputih Raman road, Central Lampung regency.

According to the President, the central government takes responsibility of national roads, the governor takes responsibility of provincial roads, and the regents / mayors take responsibility of regency / city roads.

“Since it has been going on for a long time, the central government will take it over,” he added.

To improve the road infrastructure, the President said that this year, the central government will specially disburse a budget of approximately Rp800 billion for Lampung province. The cost will cover the repair of 15 roads, and the construction phase will begin in June after the procurement process.

“After inspecting the roads, I have ordered the Minister of PUPR to initiate a procurement process, but there are roads which are the Governor’s responsibility and other roads are the responsibility of Lampung Regents. Not all road are the central government’s responsibilities,” he explained.

The President also explained that there are other provinces that need the assistance of the central government for similar problems. According to him, providing services to the community, including providing good road infrastructure, is one of the tasks of the central, provincial and regency/city governments.

“Indeed, it is the duty of the central, provincial, and regency/city governments to provide services, including providing good roads, because it is related to the goods and people mobility, and logistics costs. If the logistics cost is expensive due to damaged roads, the products will not be competitive,” he asserted.

Previously, President Jokowi inspected some damaged roads in Lampung province. The first road passed by the President was the Ryacudu Road in South Lampung regency. The President also visited Seputih Raman Road, Seputih Banyak Road, and Simpang Randu Road.

The route that the President visited today was different than the initial plan. In fact, some journalists had to leave the initially planned route to go to the current route. (Bureau of Press, Media, and Information of Presidential Secretariat/UN)(FKH/AW/LW)