JAKARTA. President-elect Joko “Jokowi” Widodo and vice president-elect Jusuf Kalla should transform their campaign promises into policies immediately following the Constitutional Court’s recent ruling, a politician said Friday.

“They should formulate campaign promises into policies right away,” the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle’s (PDI-P) deputy secretary-general, Achmad Basarah, said.

The court rejected on Thursday evening all demands in a dispute filed by losing presidential candidate Prabowo Subianto and his running mate Hatta Rajasa.

The verdict supported the General Elections Commission’s (KPU) July 22 final tally that announced Jokowi and Kalla as the winners of the July 9 presidential election.

Following the KPU’s tally announcement, Jokowi formed a transition team tasked with presenting a set of objectives for the new administration, led by former trade minister Rini Mariani Soemarno.

Basarah said that the transition team could at least formulate executable short-term programs for Jokowi and Kalla before they were inaugurated on Oct. 20.

He added that the transition team needed to formulate policies in line with those that have been issued by the current government, or even improve some of them, such as fiscal policy.

“Including analyzing the weaknesses in fiscal policy as the result of the draft 2015 State Budget submitted by President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono,” Basarah added.

In the draft budget, instead of lifting fuel subsidies, Yudhoyono increased the energy subsidy from Rp 50 trillion (US$4.27 billion) to Rp 68.2 trillion.

Basarah also said Jokowi and Kalla, and their transition team, should list the problems in each ministry and other state institutions to help them find suitable individuals to fill ministerial posts.

"So the new ministers can start work right away after being installed," he said. (put)

Editor: Yudho Winarto