President Jokowi Inaugurates Indralaya-Prabumulih Toll Road in S. Sumatra Province

President Jokowi Thursday (10/26) inaugurates the Indralaya-Prabumulih Toll Road in South Sumatra province.

President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo inaugurated the 64.5-kilometer Indralaya-Prabumulih Toll Road in South Sumatra province, Thursday (10/26).

“This is a big investment but the benefits for our country, the benefits for the people will be extraordinary if we can increase productivity. It means that this toll road must be connected to agricultural areas, connected to tourism areas, connected to plantation areas, connected to industrial areas. The benefits will be significant,” President Jokowi said.

The Indralaya-Prabumulih Toll Road, which was built with an investment of Rp12.5 trillion, is part of the 2,800-kilometer Trans Sumatra Toll Road. The President expressed belief that this infrastructure development will increase the speed of mobility of goods and services as well as Indonesia’s competitiveness.

“Last night, I met with community leaders, religious leaders, they said, ‘Sir, it used to take 10 to 12 hours from Palembang to Lampung, now it takes 3.5 hours.’ That is an amazing speed,” he said.

The President stated that so far, the total length of toll roads that have been built only reached 2,800 kilometers. He deemed it that to compete with other countries, such as the People’s Republic of China (PRC), Indonesia needs a long way to go.

“China already has 280,000 kilometers. We have 2,800 [kilometers]. They have 280,000 kilometers. We are still very far away in terms of our competitiveness,” he said.

Therefore, the President underlined that Indonesia’s infrastructure development must continue to be improved to increase Indonesia’s competitiveness.

“That is what we want to pursue so that we can compete with other countries. We must continue to build more infrastructure, which can be achieved through the State Budget, built by state-owned enterprises, built by the private sector. We canuse all three [schemes] in parallel,” he said.

On the occasion, the President also inaugurated the Patih Galung Flyover in Prabumulih city. (TGH/UN) (FI/MMB)