Analyzing Public Opinion on Moving Indonesia's Capital: Demographic and Attitudinal Trends
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ISSUE: 2022 No. 54
ISSN 2335-6677
RESEARCHERS AT ISEAS – YUSOF ISHAK INSTITUTE ANALYSE CURRENT EVENTS
Singapore | 20 May 2022
Analyzing Public Opinion on Moving Indonesia’s
Capital: Demographic and Attitudinal Trends
Burhanuddin Muhtadi*
President Joko Widodo spent the night camping in the Penajam North Paser Regency, East
Kalimantan Province on 14 March 2022, where Indonesia’s new capital will be located. Picture:
Facebook, Source: https://www.facebook.com/setkabgoid/posts/341484078009038.
* Burhanuddin Muhtadi is Visiting Fellow in the Indonesia Studies Programme at ISEAS –
Yusof Ishak Institute, and Senior Lecturer at Islamic State University (UIN) Syarif
Hidayatullah.
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EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
• Public support for relocating the Indonesian capital to East Kalimantan is divided.
In a national survey conducted in February 2022, 48.5% of respondents support the
plan while 44% disagree with it.
• Although a slight majority of respondents support the new capital city (IKN)
initiative, the level of support in 2022 reflects a decrease of nearly 5 percentage
points compared to a similar survey carried out two years ago. This decline in
support may be due to the perception that managing the Covid-19 pandemic should
be a higher priority.
• Support for the IKN plan varies by demographics and region, but political affiliation
seems to be the most salient factor in shaping public attitudes towards the plan.
Jokowi’s base in the 2019 presidential election continues to support the IKN plan
while Prabowo supporters in that election tend not to.
• Support for the IKN plan is higher among those who understand the various
technocratic reasons for moving the capital city, such as the water crisis and
overcrowding in Jakarta and creating more balanced economic development
between Java and the outer provinces. This suggests that the government must do a
better job in explaining the rationale for a new capital.
• The majority of respondents in Jakarta oppose the relocation of the capital, even
though they directly bear the brunt of overcrowding and infrastructural problems in
the city. They probably prefer the government to focus on fixing the problems in
Jakarta rather than relocating the capital.
• Failure to arrest the downward slide in public support for the IKN initiative may
jeopardise the prospects for a successful move altogether.
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INTRODUCTION
President Jokowi’s aspiration to move the nation’s capital is not a novel idea. This ambitious
capital relocation plan has resurfaced in almost every Indonesian President’s term in office.1
But it was only during Jokowi’s presidential term that this so-called national pipe dream has
begun to be realised. President Jokowi himself only revealed the plan during a limited
cabinet meeting on 29 April 2019, a few days after he was re-elected for his second term.
Prior to that, he had never mentioned the idea at all, and certainly not during the election
campaign. This probably reflects his awareness that the proposal was too controversial and
could be strongly rejected by the public, especially by those who have benefited from having
the capital city in Jakarta.
Since this idea was introduced, many analyses have appeared from technocratic,
environmental, economic and legal perspectives, but little has been discussed about what
public opinion towards the plan is like. How do Indonesians actually respond to the plan to
relocate the nation’s capital? What factors best explain support for capital relocation? What
are the demographics of supporters and opponents of the IKN plan? How does each political
affiliation base and mass organization respond to the plan? And what strategies can the
government use to increase public support for IKN? These are the questions addressed in
this article.
PUBLIC ATTITUDES DIVIDED
To answer the questions above, I analyze two representative face-to-face national surveys
conducted by an independent survey agency, Indonesian Political Indicators (Indikator), in
2020 and 2022.2 In terms of issue awareness, in 2022, 84.3% of respondents claim to know
or have heard about the plan to relocate the nation’s capital to East Kalimantan. The majority
in almost all socio-demographic bases, except for respondents in the Maluku Papua region,
are aware of the planned relocation of the capital.
However, at the public support level, there are indications of a decline in positive sentiment
towards IKN (Figure 1). In 2020, 53% of citizens stated that they strongly or quite agreed
with the plan to move the capital, but this support declined slightly to 48.5% in 2022. While
in 2020 only 33.6% said they disagreed or strongly disagreed, in 2022 the level of public
disapproval increased to 44 %. Unlike in 2020, current public attitudes are more divided
between those who are for and those who are against IKN.
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Figure I: Trends in public support for IKN (%), 2020-2022
Note
Feb'20 Feb'22
60.0
48.3
50.0
43.1
40.0
28.2
30.0
22.5
20.0 15.8
12.9
11.1
10.0 7.5
5.3 5.4
0.0
Strongly agree Quite agree Quite disagree Strongly disagree DK/NR
Note : DK/NR = Don’t Know/No Reply.
Note that the 2020 survey was conducted before the official government announcement was
made on 2 March 2020 that Covid-19 cases had appeared in Indonesia. The pandemic has
very likely reduced public support for IKN in the 2022 survey; the public health crisis
having lowered its overall priority. This is evident even among citizens who agree with
IKN; 51.1% of the supporting public stated that the idea was a non-exigent one to implement
at the moment amidst more pressing issues facing the country. This means that many
residents have a positive opinion about moving the capital city, but now find the timing
inappropriate. Also, among those who disagree, almost 80% of them think that IKN is not
urgent at all under present conditions.
It is not surprising that the survey also found that among citizens who are satisfied with
President Jokowi’s performance, the majority agree with moving the capital city (54.4%).
On the other hand, among dissatisfied citizens, most disagree with the IKN plan. However,
the proportion of Jokowi’s satisfied voters who disagree with IKN is quite high, at 38.6%.
This shows that even among supporters, the capital relocation idea has not gained enough
traction. Why the capital relocation proposal now faces heavier resistance is due to the idea
being considered less urgent amidst the pandemic situation. The fear is that the project may
heavily burden the state budget while the country is still reeling from the economic slump
of the pandemic. Moreover, the public perceives that economic recovery should take
precedence over the ambitious capital relocation plan.
WHO ARE THE SUPPORTERS OF IKN?
The survey offers insight into the demographic characteristics of supporters and opponents
of IKN. From the gender composition, men tend to show higher support for IKN than
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women. Based on age group, support among young voters under the age of 21 for IKN is
slightly higher than that among those in the age generation above it. Meanwhile, judging
from ethnic composition, only Javanese and Batak ethnic groups tend to support the idea of
moving the capital city, while Sundanese, Betawi, Minang, Malay, and Madurese ethnic
groups tend to reject it. This is presumably related to partisan factors: ethnic Javanese and
Batak make up Jokowi’s supporter base which delivered him his second presidential term,
while Sundanese, Minang, Betawi, Madurese and Malays were Prabowo’s supporters in the
2019 election.3
Table 1: Demographic profile of supporters and opponents of IKN
Quite/strongly Quite/strongly
BASE DK/NR
agree disagree
GENDER
Male 49,6 53,2 41,2 5,6
Female 50,4 43,9 46,8 9,3
AGE
55 years old 15,3 50,1 39,5 10,4
ETHNIC GROUP
Javanese 42,0 54,0 42,7 3,2
Sundanese 14,4 38,4 56,4 5,2
Batak 3,6 63,6 36,1 0,2
Madurese 3,4 33,2 58,3 8,5
Betaw i 2,9 25,8 70,9 3,3
Minang 2,6 23,1 74,4 2,6
Bugis 3,0 51,1 40,0 8,9
Malay 2,7 47,0 50,6 2,4
Others 25,4 50,1 31,8 18,1
RELIGION
Islam 87,8 45,3 48,0 6,7
NU 51,5 49,0 47,8 3,1
Muhammadiyah 3,5 48,5 42,0 9,5
Others 1,2 54,9 43,7 1,4
No religious affiliation 41,3 40,2 50,0 9,8
DK/NR 2,5 44,8 29,1 26,1
Non-Muslim 12,2 71,3 15,3 13,4
Note: DK/NR = Don’t Know/No Reply.
Figures in red denote highest percentage value for each cohort.
The partisan factor is also evidently present in the breakdown based on religion (Table 1).
Non-Muslim voters who have been Jokowi’s main support base4 solidly support his plan.
On the other hand, Muslim voters are relatively divided; in absolute terms, there are slightly
more Muslim voters who reject it than who support it.
The partisan element is also evident when dissected based on domicile, namely rural-urban
and regional demographic background (Table 2). The support from rural residents for IKN
is slightly higher than that from urban residents; this fact mirrors exit poll data showing that
Jokowi’s support in the presidential election was consistently higher in rural villages than
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in urban cities.5 So, even though they were Jokowi’s opponent in 2019, Prabowo Subianto
and his running mate, Sandiaga Uno, are now ministers in Jokowi’s cabinet, the attitude of
their voter base has remained relatively unchanged.
Table 2: Support for IKN by rural-urban and regional category
Quite/strongly Quite/strongly
BASE DK/NR
agree disagree
RURAL-URBAN
Rural 50,6 49,1 43,3 7,6
Urban 49,4 47,9 44,8 7,3
REGION
SUM ATRA 20,4 42,1 48,3 9,6
BANTEN 4,3 35,2 59,6 5,2
DKI JAKARTA 4,1 35,1 60,3 4,6
WEST JAVA 17,4 39,5 53,7 6,8
CENTRAL JAVA - DI Y 16,1 52,2 45,3 2,6
EAST JAVA 16,2 48,8 46,5 4,6
BALI NUSA TENGGARA 5,3 62,4 27,4 10,1
KALI M ANTAN 5,9 89,9 9,0 1,1
SULAWESI 7,0 63,9 29,6 6,5
M ALUKU PAPUA 3,3 20,5 27,6 51,9
Note: DK/NR = Don’t Know/No Reply.
Figures in red denote highest percentage value for each cohort (area/region).
The same pattern is also evident where regional background is concerned. In regions where
Jokowi had a landslide victory in the 2014 and 2019 presidential elections, a majority
supports his plan to move the capital. The exceptions are in Maluku and Papua where the
majority of the people do not have an attitude or opinion about the plan since they generally
do not know about it. The biggest support comes from Kalimantan where an overwhelming
majority is behind the government and DPR’s decision to move the capital to their island.
In Jakarta, Jokowi had a slight advantage over Prabowo in the 2019 presidential election,
but the absolute majority of Jakarta residents tend to reject IKN. This is expected because
they have enjoyed the privilege of being residents of the nation’s capital for years. Be that
as it may, in Prabowo’s strongholds such as West Java, Sumatra, and Banten, the majority
also rejects IKN.
Meanwhile, when analyzed by education level, the higher the education level of a
respondent, the higher is the level of support shown for IKN. 57.7% of those with university
education and above support creating the new capital. At the same time, support among
those with lower secondary education tends to be divided. The same pattern is also evident
where income level is concerned. The higher the income level, the higher the support for
IKN, and vice versa.
PUBLIC SUPPORT BASED ON POLITICAL AFFILIATION
The partisan factor for supporting IKN is highly evident when we break it down based on
the presidential choice made in 2019 election. Among 55.5% of respondents who claim to
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be Jokowi-Ma’ruf Amin voters, the majority support building the new capital. On the other
hand, 61% of Prabowo-Sandiaga voters reject IKN outright. Also, although the majority of
Jokowi’s supporters support the plan, a significant minority among these display
disagreement with IKN.
When analyzed further based on the respondents’ party vote in the 2019 legislative
elections, we get further insight into why more than a third of Jokowi’s supporters have
negative sentiments about IKN. Table 3 clearly shows that the mass base of Jokowi’s
coalition parties does not solidly support Jokowi’s ambition to develop a new capital city.
Only the PDI-P and NasDem voter bases solidly support the plan. On the other hand, the
majority of PKS and Democrat mass bases – the two remaining opposition parties in
parliament – reject IKN. Meanwhile, Golkar’s mass base is equally divided on that issue.
Table 3: Attitude towards IKN based on political affiliation
Quite/strongly Quite/strongly
BASE DK/NR
agree disagree
PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE BASES
Prabow o Subianto 24,1 45,0 49,9 5,1
Ganjar Pranow o 23,4 63,9 34,6 1,5
Anies Basw edan 18,1 38,4 56,2 5,4
Ridw an Kamil 6,3 49,3 49,0 1,7
Agus Harimurti Yudhoyono 6,0 35,7 62,2 2,1
Sandiaga Salahuddin U no 5,0 56,5 37,8 5,8
Khofifah I ndar Paraw ansa 3,4 46,9 46,4 6,7
Erick Thohir 1,7 72,7 26,3 1,0
Puan M aharani 1,3 68,7 29,7 1,6
Airlangga Hartarto ,7 64,8 35,0 ,2
DK/NR 10,1 35,2 23,8 40,9
2019 PARTY CHOICE
PKB 9,7 43,9 52,0 4,1
Gerindra 12,6 38,5 57,3 4,2
PDI P 19,3 61,2 32,0 6,8
Golkar 12,3 48,0 47,6 4,4
NasDem 9,0 64,1 32,2 3,8
PKS 8,2 28,7 64,9 6,4
PPP 4,5 39,9 60,0 ,1
PAN 6,8 42,9 50,3 6,8
Demokrat 7,8 31,3 62,3 6,4
Others 9,7 55,6 36,6 7,9
2019 PRESIDENTIAL CHOICE
Jokow i - M a'ruf Amin 55,5 56,3 35,4 8,2
Prabow o - Sandiaga 44,5 34,9 60,9 4,2
Note: DK/NR = Don’t Know/No Reply.
Figures in red denote highest percentage value for each cohort (individual/party).
The variation in support for IKN is more visible when based on the supporter base of each
of the presidential candidates projected to run in 2024. The polling firm Indikator asks about
the electability of ten presidential candidates if the election were held during the 2022
survey. While the electability of the ten varies, the support bases of Ganjar Pranowo
(Governor of Central Java), Erick Thohir (Minister of SOEs), Puan Maharani (Chairman of
the DPR and PDIP elite) and Airlangga Hartarto (Coordinating Minister for the Economy
and Golkar Chairman) tend to solidly support Jokowi’s agenda. This is quite logical because
apart from these four candidates viewed as individuals in close proximity to Jokowi, their
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support base at the same time also coincides with Jokowi’s base. What sticks out is the
majority of Sandiaga’s supporters; these support IKN even though Sandiaga was Jokowi’s
adversary in the 2019 election. Sandiaga’s position as Jokowi’s minister as well as his public
appearance with Jokowi on many occasions seem to have changed the attitude of his
supporters towards being more positive towards IKN.
On the other hand, the majority of supporters of Anies Baswedan (Governor of Jakarta) and
Agus Harimurti Yudhoyono (Chairman of Democrats) reject the new capital. These two
figures have been presenting themselves as Jokowi’s oppositional figures, thereby attracting
voters who are disillusioned or opposed to the Jokowi government. Prabowo supporters are
quite divided, although slightly more among them support IKN than are against it.
Supporters of the Governor of West Java Ridwan Kamil and of the Governor of East Java
Khofifah Indar Parawansa are also sharply divided regarding the plan to move the capital.
HOW TO BOOST PUBLIC SUPPORT FOR IKN?
Given the downward trend of public support for the new capital, the government urgently
needs to find ways to turn the situation around. Moreover, the IKN plan should no longer
be seen as just a reflection of Jokowi’s personal ambition, but a long-term Indonesian
project that was popularly passed into law on 18 January 2022. Of the nine factions in the
DPR, only PKS firmly rejected IKN, while the Democrat party together with the remaining
seven other governing coalition parties jointly voted to pass the IKN Bill.6
Table 4: Support for capital relocation based on its rationale
Agree/Strongl Disagree/Strongly
Base DK/NA
y agree disagree
JAKARTA IS OVERBURDENED
Yes, I know 50,5 59,8 37,2 3,0
I bel i eve i t 80,6 69,7 28,2 2,1
I don't bel i eve i t 16,6 19,4 78,6 2,0
DK/NA 2,8 14,1 50,0 35,9
I Don't know 49,5 36,9 51,0 12,1
JAVA ISLAND IS OVERPOPULATED
Yes, I know 63,2 57,9 39,5 2,6
I bel i eve i t 88,7 62,9 34,8 2,3
I don't bel i eve i t 10,0 17,7 80,4 1,9
DK/NA 1,3 26,2 48,0 25,8
I Don't know 36,8 32,4 51,7 15,9
ECONOMIC DISTRIBUTION OF JAVA - OUTSIDE JAVA
Yes, I know 47,5 62,9 35,8 1,2
I bel i eve i t 85,4 70,9 28,5 0,7
I don't bel i eve i t 13,4 16,8 80,5 2,7
DK/NA 1,2 15,4 58,6 26,0
I Don't know 52,5 35,5 51,4 13,1
Note: DK/NA = Don’t Know/No Answer.
Figures in red denote highest percentage value for each area.
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Agree/Strongl Disagree/Strongly
Base DK/NA
y agree disagree
WATER SUPPLY CRISIS IN JAVA, ESPECIALLY IN JAKARTA
Yes, I know 37,4 60,1 38,8 1,1
I believe it 79,6 69,2 30,2 0,6
I don't believe it 19,2 25,8 73,3 0,9
DK/NA 1,2 9,1 58,3 32,6
I Don't know 62,6 41,6 47,1 11,3
POTENTIAL THREAT OF SUNDA STRAT MEGATHRUST EARTHQUAKE IN JAKARTA
Yes, I know 33,6 61,3 37,2 1,6
I believe it 75,0 71,2 28,0 0,8
I don't believe it 22,9 32,8 65,9 1,3
DK/NA 2,1 15,4 51,1 33,5
I Don't know 66,4 42,1 47,5 10,5
Note: DK/NA = Don’t Know/No Answer.
Figures in red denote highest percentage value for each area.
Our analysis suggests that one potential way for the government to boost public support is
to disseminate the objective and practical rationales for why the capital needs to be
relocated. Indikator’s survey posed to respondents a series of questions to ascertain the level
of knowledge and support for various technocratic policy rationales that have been used to
justify why a new capital is needed. The level of awareness among respondents from 34
provinces throughout Indonesia about the reasons behind moving the capital turns out to be
underwhelming. As shown in Table 4, only a third of the respondents are aware of the two
main rationales that are used to justify relocating the capital, namely “Jakarta is threatened
by the Sunda Strait Megathrust earthquake” (33.6% of the respondents were aware) and
“the crisis of water supply in Java, especially Jakarta” (37% were aware).
For respondents who claim to be aware of the rationales for a new capital, Indikator then
asked follow-up questions about how much they believed in or supported those rationales.
I have correlated the public’s knowledge of the rationales with the level of trust/support for
such rationales. The findings show that the absolute majority of respondents who are aware
of the rationales express strong belief / support for these reasons (Table 4). In contrast,
where respondents display lack of awareness of the rationales, their levels of skepticism and
resistance to the capital move tend to increase.
This finding clearly shows that if the government wants to boost positive perceptions of
IKN, then the public needs to be made more aware of the reasons for the move.
CONCLUSION
The idea of moving the Indonesian capital from Jakarta, which is widely considered to be
overstretched in its ability to remain the seat of the central government and the locus of
economic activities in the country, has persistently cropped up since the era of Indonesia’s
founding father President Sukarno and been revisited in every presidential era ever since.
However, this ambitious idea has failed to materialize, until now. It was only during the
time of President Jokowi that proper plans for the construction of the new capital began to
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take shape. Parliament passed the IKN Bill into Law earlier this year. But instead of
increasing public support after the legal instrument was passed, public resistance has
increased instead. Opposition to IKN has increased from 33% in 2020 to 44% in February
2022.
If this deteriorating trend in public support for IKN continues, the government will find it
difficult to carry out the stages of relocating the capital effectively. Public objection may
also disrupt the process of relocating civil servants and public officials from the 82 state
institutions or ministries to IKN, and it is highly plausible that in the future, dissent will
increase among civil servants or public officials who refuse to relocate to the new capital.
If public resistance grows, it is not impossible that the stance of government coalition parties
that originally supported it could shift. Furthermore, if the Jokowi government fails to arrest
the slide in public levels of support for the capital move, the next administration may be
reluctant to follow through with it and instead place blame on the Jokowi’s administration
for the costs and confusion involved.
For this reason, the Jokowi government urgently needs to increase public support for IKN.
First, the partisan effect that affects support or rejection of IKN must be addressed. All
parties supporting the government, including those who were previously in the opposition,
must be involved in order to make the IKN agenda a success. Prabowo and Sandiaga, both
currently serving as Jokowi’s ministers, including two former opposition parties, Gerindra
and PAN, which are now part of the government coalition, need to be drawn in more
intensely to shore up support for the IKN agenda. To further boost positive perceptions of
IKN, the government also needs to intensify socialization on why the country needs a new
capital.
The absolute majority of residents who know or display high level of awareness of these
rationales tend to be strongly supportive of the IKN project, compared to citizens who are
unaware of the rationales being presented. Of course, in communicating these rationales,
the government risks being perceived to be ignoring the infrastructural issues facing Jakarta
and to be instead taking the easy way out, by moving the capital. The government needs to
convince the public that it remains committed to solving the classic problems that have long
plagued Jakarta, such as the water crisis, the threat of earthquakes and Jakarta sinking, and
others. If the government is successful in socializing the rationale why Indonesia needs to
build a new capital, then public support for IKN should increase and Jokowi can leave a
good legacy behind for the next government to build upon.
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ENDNOTES
1
Rohmatin Bonasir, “Rencana pemindahan ibu kota dari Jakarta: Berapa lama waktu yang
diperlukan dan apa saja syarat-syarat ibu kota?” BBC News Indonesia, 29 April 2019,
https://www.bbc.com/indonesia/indonesia-48093451
2
The first survey was carried out simultaneously in all regions on 5-10 February 2020, while the
second survey was conducted on 11-21 February 2022. The population for this survey were
Indonesian citizens with the right to vote, who were thus 17 years old and above, or already
married when the survey was conducted. Using a questionnaire, the interviews were conducted
face-to-face by our interviewers on 1,220 voting-age adults in the first survey and 4,220
respondents in the second survey who were selected with multistage random sampling. These were
proportionally distributed over the 34 provinces.
3
Indikator Politik Indonesia, “2019 General Election exit poll,” 17 April 2019, p. 42
https://indikator.co.id/rilis-exit-poll-pemilu-2019-2/
4
Ibid, p. 41. For comparison, see the results of the 2014 presidential election exit poll, Indikator
Politik Indonesia, “Hasil exit poll Pemilu Presiden,” 9 July 2014, p. 21,
https://indikator.co.id/laporan-exit-poll-pemilu-presiden-2014/
5
Ibid, p. 43.
6
Nicholas Ryan Aditya, “PKS Tolak RUU IKN Disahkan di Rapat Paripurna, Ini Alasannya”,
Kompas.com, 18 January 2021, https://nasional.kompas.com/read/2022/01/18/09200151/pks-
tolak-ruu-ikn-disahkan-di-rapat-paripurna-ini-alasannya?page=all.
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