Press Statement of President of the Republic of Indonesia on the Ban of This Year’s “Mudik” Friday, 16 April 2021

Bismillahirrahmanirrahim.

Assalamu’alaikum warahmatullahi wabarakatuh.

 Ladies and Gentlemen, Fellow Countrymen,

This year’s Ramadan is the second Ramadan amid the COVID-19 pandemic and we still have to keep preventing the spread of COVID-19 disease from spreading any further. Therefore, since earlier the Government has decided to ban Eid homecoming (mudik) this year. This decision is taken over various considerations because last year’s experience, there was an upward trend in COVID-19 cases after four times long holidays in a year.

First, during the Eid holiday last year, there was a 93-percent increase in daily confirmed cases and a weekly confirmed death rate increase up to 66 percent. The second upward tend in COVID-19 cases occurred during long holiday on 20 – 23 August 2020, which resulted in a 119-percent increase in confirmed cases and an increase up to 57 percent in weekly confirmed death rate . The third increase occurred during long holiday on 28 October –  1 November 2020, which resulted in a 95-percent increase in COVID-19 cases and a 75-percent increase in weekly death rate. Last, the fourth, there was an 78-percent increase in the number of daily cases and the weekly death rate increased up to 46 percent.

Another consideration is that we must maintain the downward trend of active cases in Indonesia in the last two months – the confirmed cases decreased  from 176,672 cases on 5 February 2021 to 108,032 cases on 15 April 2021. The daily rate of COVID-19 case addition has also relatively decreased. We all have experienced 14 – 15 thousand cases per day in January 2021, but fortunately the rate is now in the range of 4 – 6 thousand cases per day. The recovery trend also continues to increase. On 1 March 2021 there were 1,151,915 patients recovered or 85.88 percent of the total cases, and on 15 April 2021 the rate increased – there were 1,438,254 patients recovered or it has reached 90.5 percent of the total cases.

Therefore, we must really keep together this favorable momentum. Thus, on this year’s Eid the Government decided to ban mudik for State Civil Apparatus (ASN), the Indonesian National DefenceForces (TNI) the Indonesian National Police (Polri) personnel employees of state-owned enterprises, employees of private companies, and all people.

Ladies and Gentlemen,

I really understand that we are all missing our relatives in this situation, especially on Eid day this year. But, let us put safety first to not do mudik. Let us fill this year’s Ramadan with efforts to break the chains of transmission of this disease to save all our relatives, ourselves, and the whole people.

I wish all Muslims happy fasting during this Ramadan. May Allah subhanahu wa ta’ala bless all of us and our nation.

Wassalamu’alaikum warahmatullahi wabarakatuh. (AP/LW)