THE recently dismissed head of the National Nutrition Agency has been arrested on corruption charges related to a multi-billion- dollar free-meals programme.
The programme delivered on a campaign promise of President Prabowo Subianto and aimed to fight malnutrition by feeding nearly 90 million children and pregnant women.
But it has come under steep criticism due to high costs and cases of food poisoning among schoolchildren who consumed the meals.
Prabowo fired agency head Dadan Hindayana on Tuesday and replaced him with the agency’s deputy chief.
Investigators also searched the agency’s offices early Wednesday.
Before the Attorney General’s Office (Ago) made Wednesday’s arrest announcement, Hindayana could be seen being led out in handcuffs, wearing a detainee red vest and a black shirt, and escorted into a green prison van.
Prosecutors also arrested two other suspects, Sony Sonjaya, the Deputy Head of the Nutrition Provision Division and Lodewyk Pusung, the Deputy Head of the Organisational Development and Institutional Relations Division.
Both were fired on Tuesday.
Prosecutors only published their initials, but the Minister of the State Secretariat, Prasetyo Hadi, later revealed their names.
Syarief Sulaeman Nahdi, Ago’s Director of Investigation, told reporters that based on the “examination and two pieces of sufficient evidence”, the three were named as suspects “in the criminal investigation of corruption related to the management of the Free Nutritious Meal programme at the National Nutrition Agency for the 2025-2026 period”.
The Free Nutritious Meal programme is implemented through foundations operating in schools.
Investigators allege these foundations were used to facilitate criminal activities and were linked to agency officials and employees.
Despite failing to meet the eligibility requirements to become programme partners, they were allegedly approved by manipulating the agency’s partner verification system with the suspects’ help, Syarief said.
“These foundations receive incentives worth billions of rupiah every day,” he said, adding that investigators are still calculating the damage to state coffers.
Prasetyo said on Tuesday the three suspects were dismissed for failing to adhere to “standard operating procedure ... implementing governance, including maintaining food quality.”
He stressed the government’s continuing commitment to the free meals programme.
“Services to the public must not be disrupted in any way,” he told reporters.
The meals programme is expected to cost US$28bil (RM111.6bil) through 2029.
One of Prabowo’s goals was to fight malnutrition and help farmers by purchasing their harvests, but critics had questioned whether the programme was affordable and logistically possible in a vast archipelago of more than 282 million people. — AP
