What Drives Jokowi to Reshuffle the Cabinet?

The presidential palace released a video of the Plenary Cabinet Meeting at the State Palace, held on Thursday (6/18), showing President Joko Widodo’s anger at the ministers. Jokowi admitted that he was disappointed after realizing several ministers did not work fast enough to mitigate the COVID-19 pandemic. He also asked them to ramp up the work rhythm above normal and believed that abnormal policies were necessary responses to the ongoing health and economic crisis.

The president was also upset upon realizing that several ministries were slow in spending their budgets and lackluster in distributing social aids, worth hundreds of trillions of rupiah. He also mentioned that the Health Ministry could only use 1.53 percent of Rp75 trillion worth of health budget.

Jokowi also warned that he would not hesitate to reshuffle the cabinet or replace underperforming ministers. “I may dissolve the institution or reshuffle. I have considered everything,” he said in a video uploaded by the Presidential Secretariat on Sunday (6/28).