JAKARTA: President Prabowo Subianto has pushed for cooperation between Singapore’s sovereign wealth fund Temasek and Indonesia’s state-asset fund Danantara in the development of Batam, Riau Islands.

In his first state visit to Singapore following his inauguration in October, Prabowo attended the annual leaders’ retreat with Singapore Prime Minister Lawrence Wong in which he expressed the hope of partnership between the funds.

“We look forward to close collaboration between Temasek and Danantara in all sectors, especially the sectors of renewable energy, sustainable industrial zones and the development of Batam, Bintan and Karimun,” said Prabowo on Monday (June 16), referring to the three islands that are in proximity of one other.

Prabowo hopes for Temasek’s support in the development of the low carbon energy sector and critical infrastructure in the region with the special economic zones status. It remains unclear in what shape the cooperation could manifest.

In the case of Batam, it is located some 20 to 30km of the Singapore Strait, equivalent to around an hour-long ferry ride, while Bintan is located east of Batam and Karimun west.

Batam and Singapore are connected with multiple terminals that have ferries departing every day, making it common for people to live in Batam and commute to Singapore daily.

In his address, Prabowo bluntly said that Temasek was Singapore’s achievement that Indonesia copies “with pride” when establishing Danantara. He also added his administration housing programme also took some inspiration from the city-state’s own programme.

“In school, we’re not allowed to copy our friends’ homework or exams. But in real life, why not copy the best practice? […] I hope there’s no copyright,” Prabowo said.

Established in February and modelled after Temasek, Danantara aims to eventually manage over US$900 billion in assets with initial capital of $20 billion.

Danantara has brought 844 state-owned enterprises (SOEs) under its operational umbrella, whose dividends, projected at around $7 billion this year, were among the sources of Danantara’s funding to execute its strategic investment plans.

Prabowo’s and Wong’s meeting, the first for both recently inaugurated leaders, produced 19 agreements, including the implementation of a defence cooperation agreement (DCA), cross-border electricity trade, a sustainable industrial zone and a bilateral financial agreement between the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) and Bank Indonesia (BI).

“I think this marks the high value we attach to the relationship and the friendship between Singapore and Indonesia,” Prabowo said in a joint statement.

While Monday’s meeting marked the first official meeting between the leaders, Prabowo has met Wong several times, including during the latter’s state visit to Jakarta in November for an “introductory” meeting.

Wong said “Singapore-Indonesia relations are in excellent shape”, and the two leaders had agreed to “take it further and chart even stronger ties in this new era of cooperation”.

Before the meeting of two leaders, Indonesia has reiterated that it agreed to export 3.4 gigawatts (GW) of clean electricity to Singapore by the end of 2035.

This followed an agreement between Singapore’s Energy and Science and Technology Minister-in-charge, Tan See Leng, and Energy and Mineral Resources Minister Bahlil Lahadalia on cross-border electricity on June 13 in Jakarta. - The Jakarta Post/ANN