T

he foreign business community in Indonesia expects that the presidential election will pave the way for much-needed reforms to allow the country to punch its weight, while refraining from explicitly acknowledging the winner of Wednesday'€™s presidential race.

Major business groups representing overseas investors in Indonesia said on Wednesday that the top priorities to be laid out by the new president and his future cabinet would include infrastructure development, human resource investment and improvements in the regulatory environment.

Joko '€œJokowi'€ Widodo and his running mate Jusuf Kalla claimed victory after quick counts by several major and credible pollsters, including by the country'€™s largest newspapaper, Kompas, concluded that Jokowi had won the race. Rivals Prabowo Subianto and Hatta Rajasa, however, also insisted they had won, based on surveys by somewhat less reliable pollsters.

European Chamber of Commerce in Indonesia (EuroCham) vice chairman Tiku Menon pointed out that Jokowi'€™s win would bring '€œa wind of change to the horizon'€ as he would commit to enhancing the overall business climate through transparency, uniformity, the rule of law and fair trade; prerequisites if Indonesia aspired to become a significant power in the regional as well as global arena.

'€œPak Jokowi has the opportunity through change to lead the essentially young and enthusiastic people of Indonesia to greater heights in proven performance,'€ he said.

Tiku added that a massive upgrade of infrastructure would remain the need of the hour, while investment in transportation, energy, telecommunications and IT as well as the education of its greatest asset '€” its huge population '€” should be among the highest priorities.

Enhanced infrastructure, for instance, boosted Indonesia'€™s rank by 12 places to 38th in the Global Competitiveness Index (GCI) report published by the World Economic Forum last year.

While addressing several issues similar to the EuroCham concerns, representatives from the American Chamber of Commerce (AmCham) Indonesia declined to comment on the result of the polls.

The official result will be available no later than July 22, but previous quick counts by independent organizations in the past have provided reasonably accurate projections, including those of the legislative election in April.

'€œThe truth is, such a close race to the end is testament to the fact that democracy is at work in Indonesia,'€ AmCham president Brian Arnold said.

From the perspective of foreign investors, the important issue was predictability and rule-of-law in business dealings in addition to the availability of appropriate infrastructure and a skilled work force, he added.

'€œA foreign investor coming into a new market will need more certainty on these issues to be comfortable with large-scale investment,'€ Arnold added.

Yoshida Susumu, the secretary-general of the Jakarta Japan Club (JJC) which represents 558 Japanese firms in Greater Jakarta, also refrained from touching on the election result. He noted the most important thing for Japanese firms was to continue their businesses in compliance with the policy direction under the new administration.

'€œJapanese firms hope the new administration will have a better insight on how to enhance Indonesian industry in the long run,'€ he said.

According to Susumu, the expansion of infrastructure, notably industrial and logistics-related infrastructure such as roads, seaports, airports and power-generation capacity, should be the most urgent items on the agenda to be addressed by the new president and his cabinet, as they would drive the force of industrial expansion in Southeast Asia'€™s largest economy.

Apart from that, the government must increase transparency, predictability and stability of regulations essential to a better business climate and avoid sudden policy changes affecting business, such as drastic increases in electricity prices, said the Japanese businessman.