Authorities are claiming early success in managing this year’s record-breaking Idul Fitri travel season, buoyed by reduced congestion during the expected peak of traffic counterflows on Monday and Tuesday.

Marking the comeback of a vinyl-record pressing plant in Indonesia after a nearly 50-year hiatus, PHR Pressing is set to resume domestic vinyl production in the country with a new pressing plant in Cengkareng, West Jakarta. 

As the seven-day Idul Fitri holiday period came to an end on Tuesday, millions had begun the return trip from their hometowns, while others took the chance to flock to tourist destinations in and around Jakarta.

Forty years on, observers and government officials alike have noted how The Jakarta Post has not only become the world’s window into Indonesia, but has also helped bring the global agenda to local readers.

More than 200,000 cars carrying returning travelers are expected to enter the capital each day starting Monday.   

In Jakarta, hundreds of thousands of Muslims crowded Istiqlal Grand Mosque, the largest mosque in the country, to attend Idul Fitri mass prayers on Saturday morning.

With over 1,000 Indonesians living in Sudan, the Foreign Ministry said its embassy in Khartoum had established a safe house as well as logistical support for its citizens, though currently it has only succeeded in evacuating 43 nationals. 

State-owned toll road operator Jasa Marga ends midnight Thursday the one-way traffic system from Cikampek in West Java to Kalikangkung in Central Java on the trans-Java toll road.

The government announced on Thursday evening that the first day of the month of Syawal, which marks the Idul Fitri celebration, will fall on Saturday following an isbat (confirmation) meeting.

Neither the President nor the Vice President will be holding an Idul Fitri open house, which they held annually in the years before the pandemic.

Public transportation hubs and thoroughfares across the country have been clogged with millions of Indonesians making their journeys back home.

Major seaports and toll roads are packed, while airports and bus terminals are also full of travellers looking forward to reuniting with their families.

Islamic organizations, lawmakers and Cabinet ministers have called on regional administrations accommodate requests to hold prayers at public venues for Idul Fitri dates that differ from those set by the government, amid reports of rejections from various local governments.

Lampung Governor Arinal Djunaidi has become embroiled in controversy over his alleged response to a student who criticized poor infrastructure in the region on the popular video-sharing platform TikTok.

In a bid to improve the productivity of civil servants, President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo signed Presidential Regulation (Perpres) No. 21/2023 on Wednesday granting them greater working flexibility.

While the Health Ministry said that a recent uptick in the daily caseload and five new Arcturus cases were nothing to worry about, it still urged holiday travelers to take precautionary measures, including making sure their vaccinations were up-to-date.

President Joko "Jokowi" Widodo has commuted the sentence of drug trafficking convict Merri Utami from the death penalty to life in prison, the convict’s lawyers have said, to the relief of activists who have long been supporting her plea.

The Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK) has warned public officials not to receive any Idul Fitri holiday bonuses (THR) from private parties, particularly since these bonuses have become a popular guise for corruption and bribery following a recent string of KPK arrests.

The Indonesia Corruption Watch (ICW), which perused LHKPN data on the KPK website, has reported 55 lawmakers to the House of Representatives’ ethics council for their failure to do their obligation as public officials, as mandated by the 2002 KPK Law and the 1999 Law on Clean Governance.

President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo is calling on participants in this year’s Idul Fitri mudik (exodus) to complete their COVID-19 vaccinations before departure, as the government contends with the discovery of two imported cases of a new coronavirus strain responsible for case spikes in several countries.

Transportation observers are urging the government to set up a centralized mudik information database to accommodate travelers and reduce the public’s reliance on long-distance motorcycle trips.

The government is set to provide more lenient punishment in its revision of the 2016 Electronic Information and Transactions (ITE) Law by introducing a restorative justice approach in the complaint offenses case handling.

To allow government officials to enjoy the first Idul Fitri holiday with loved ones without any health restrictions since the COVID-19 pandemic started, President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo said he would not be holding an open house at the State Palace this year.

The Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK) supervisory board has summoned  five KPK leaders for questioning over alleged ethics violations by relieving a former investigation director Brig. Gen. Endar Priantoro of his duties.

The Jakarta High Court has upheld both the conviction and death sentence of former two-star police general Ferdy Sambo for the premeditated murder of his aide-de-camp Nofriansyah Yosua Hutabarat and for tampering with evidence to orchestrate a cover-up.

The government has once again delayed the implementation of the long-awaited excise tax on sweetened beverages, raising questions over its commitment to improving post-coronavirus pandemic public health.

With the 2023 mudik (exodus) season expected to see a record of more than 120 million Indonesians traveling across the country, authorities plan to temporarily open 11 new toll roads across Java and Sumatra to accommodate travelers.

Through the omnibus health bill, the government and lawmakers are looking to allow certain hospitals to conduct their own postgraduate education as an answer to the country’s lack of specialist doctors.

The recent freezing of FIFA Forward Fund as penalty for Indonesia’s botched hosting of the U-20 World Cup would not financially disrupt Indonesia’s capacity to host the U-17 match, but it would still be a challenging ordeal to overcome, analysts said.

The government aims to significantly reduce tuberculosis incidence in the country by 2030, after the first two years of the COVID-19 pandemic severely disrupted its TB response and treatment program.