The Merah Putih Village/Ward Cooperative (KDMP) program, which is currently being aggressively developed, is drawing sharp criticism. The Lokataru Foundation warns that the active involvement of the Indonesian National Armed Forces (TNI) in the development and management of this economic program has the potential to undermine democratic values and restrict the space for civil liberties at the grassroots level.
Executive Director of the Lokataru Foundation, Delpedro Marhaen, revealed that the plan to expand the KDMP to reach 80,000 points across the country has triggered great concern. According to him, this giant network is highly vulnerable to being misused to control budget flows, dominate food logistics routes, and transform into a political control machine ahead of the 2029 Election.
The institutional design of the KDMP, which is instructive and top-down, is deemed to facilitate mass mobilization for electoral purposes. Lokataru highlights the utilization of the military's territorial command structure down to the village level as an instrument to smooth this control. If control over the community's basic needs is merged with the military network, public oversight of potential underground political movements will be very difficult to carry out.
Military involvement in the village economic sphere is considered contrary to the spirit of TNI reform, which mandates the military to return to its defense function and stay out of civil affairs. Delpedro emphasized that the ideal of cooperatives should grow independently based on the initiative and collective consciousness of village residents, rather than being driven by military command instructions.
Echoing this sentiment, Lokataru Foundation researcher Fahrul Lubis stated that this national-scale program is no longer just a tool for community economic empowerment. The organization's study shows a shift in the function of the KDMP into a new political infrastructure, opening wide gaps for power consolidation and political patronage practices at the local level by various interest factions in the future.
