The Jakarta City Council has increased the budget for the inauguration ceremony for the capital's new governor and vice governor, to be held on Oct. 7, to Rp 1.05 billion (US$109,550) from Rp 822 million as previously reported.
The allocated fund will be taken from the 2012 regional budget.
According to the council secretary, Mangara Pardede, the increase was necessary because the council had not included the budget for security measurement for the ceremony.
Aside from that, he added, many members of the council wanted the ceremony to be as extravagant as Jakarta's anniversary ceremony where notable singers and an orchestra group were invited to perform.
“The aforementioned budget may not be spent in its entirety, so anything that remains can be transferred to the city's budget,” said Mangara.
Meanwhile, Jokowi had previously suggested that the city council arrange a modest inauguration ceremony for him.
“The inauguration ceremony is not that important. Therefore, it should be as modest as possible,” Jokowi said, as quoted by tribunnews.com.
The Jakarta General Elections Committee (KPU) is scheduled to officially announce the result of the gubernatorial runoff election on Sept. 29. Several quick counts conducted by pollsters have reported Joko “Jokowi” Widodo to be victorious.
According to KPU Jakarta municipal-level officials, Jokowi received 611,366 out of the 1,328,944 votes cast in East Jakarta; 507,257 out of 1,000,627 votes in South Jakarta; 577,232 out of 1,066,945 votes in West Jakarta; 432,714 out of 743,580 votes in North Jakarta and 256,529 out of 515,729 in Central Jakarta.
Fauzi Bowo won the most votes in Thousand Islands regency, receiving 8,794 out of 11,216 votes cast there. (riz/swd)
