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Jokowi gearing up to meet Trump in US next month
The government has plans for President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo to make an official visit to the United States next month, the first time since Donald Trump came to power as president in Washington, DC, for a meeting that analysts believe could help the business interests of both countries
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span>The government has plans for President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo to make an official visit to the United States next month, the first time since Donald Trump came to power as president in Washington, DC, for a meeting that analysts believe could help the business interests of both countries.
Officials have remained tight-lipped on specific details regarding the visit, apart from a hint that Coordinating Maritime Affairs and Investment Minister Luhut Pandjaitan dropped during his visit to Washington last week.
Luhut said Jokowi would visit the US in March to sign a landmark deal for Americans to invest in Indonesia’s sovereign fund, which experts believed would trigger an influx of money from the US private sector into numerous projects across the archipelago.
Presidential spokesperson Fadjroel Rachman confirmed the plan earlier this week, although he refused to give the exact date of Jokowi’s trip to Washington.
“Yes, there is a plan,” he told The Jakarta Post, without elaborating on the proposed deal.
Similarly, Foreign Ministry spokesman Teuku Faizasyah said there was “an outstanding invitation” from Trump for Jokowi to pay him an official visit and that “the two governments were discussing a mutually agreeable date” for it.
It remains unclear whether it would be a largely ceremonial state visit or an actual working visit.
The visit may or may not coincide with an earlier invitation issued by Trump to Southeast Asian leaders for a special ASEAN-US summit in Las Vegas, with multiple sources refusing to confirm Indonesian attendance.
Members of ASEAN’s Committee of Permanent Representatives met with the US Mission to ASEAN last week to discuss preparations for the summit, the first since countries from the region snubbed a regular meeting with Washington officials in Thailand last year, in protest over US regional disengagement.
Jokowi last set foot in the US in 2015 to meet with outgoing US president Barack Obama. At the time, the two leaders broached numerous topics, from democracy to Jokowi’s interest in the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) agreement. Washington left the TPP after Trump came into office.
Should Jokowi depart for Washington next month, it would be the first time since he was reelected last April, although both he and Trump have had other opportunities for casual talks and bilateral meetings on the margins of international forums such as the G20 Summit.
Trump himself has not visited Southeast Asia’s largest economy, even though the mercurial US leader has an outstanding invitation from Jokowi.
The last US president to visit Indonesia was Obama, who made a state visit to meet then-president Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono in 2010. At the time, Obama gave a memorable speech at the University of Indonesia recalling memories of his childhood living in Menteng, a wealthy Central Jakarta suburb that has long hosted foreigners and their nation’s ambassadors.
Some analysts have pinned high hopes on the success of Jokowi’s eventual visit amid global economic headwinds, further strained by a public health emergency brought on by a deadly virus outbreak in China that has decimated growth and is grinding global production lines to a halt.
The visit to China’s rival superpower is timely and relevant to ensure Indonesia can sail past a sea of global uncertainties, said Suzie Sudarman, director of the American studies center at the University of Indonesia.
Moreover, with the recent skirmishes between Indonesia and China in the North Natuna Sea, the visit would play a vital role in sending a strong message that Indonesia can maintain its grip on global affairs.
Suzie said that Jokowi’s meeting with Trump could be completely different from the one he had with Obama. With Trump, she predicted the dialogue would be more transactional in nature, fired up by the current hype at home from Jokowi’s efforts to streamline and ease foreign investment processes.
“The relationship will clearly be about business,” Suzie told The Jakarta Post this week.
In his second term, amid adverse effects from the US-China trade war, Jokowi looks likely to focus more on tangible business link-ups than what Suzie dubbed in her comparison to Obama as “hopes [rather] than realities”.
“With our experience hosting, for instance, the IMF [International Monetary Fund]-World Bank annual meeting and the push to reform domestic laws with the omnibus bill, these could be some of the key points that may be included in the talks, possibly opening up the dialogue and negotiations,” she said. “America’s business is business; if there is nothing to be offered, it is hard to see a meeting go well.”
Total two-way trade with the US in 2019 was worth US$26.97 billion, with the balance swinging in Indonesia’s favor with a surplus of $8.46 billion, according to Statistics Indonesia. (tjs)
