"The government regulation has to be issued to harmonize it with regulations in one ministry to another. It could take three months or more. I hope that the government regulation on village administration will have been signed by May 2014," President Yudhoyono stated, when opening a national working meeting and seminar of the association at the Jogja Expo Center (JEC) here on Monday.
The President explained that with the law on village administration, village leaders would be able to advance the development in their respective regions.
"We want to carry out better village development with increased and well-spent budget. We want to increase the capacity of village officials, micro, medium scale businesses and the involvement of women in village development," the Head of State remarked.
Yudhoyono pointed out that 10 percent of regional fund transfers from the state budget must be allocated to villages whose number across the country has reached about 70 thousand. The funds could reach Rp1.4 billion for each village.
The budget for village development could also be taken from the regional government budget based on the available funds at the provincial and district levels.
Earlier the President opened the national working meeting and seminar of All-Indonesia Village Administrations Association (Apdesi).
The meeting themed "From Villages for Indonesia" brings together about three thousand participants from the central and provincial executive boards of the association and village heads from across Yogyakarta and Central Java provinces.
Also present at the meeting were Coordinating Minister for Political, Legal and Security Affairs Joko Suyanto, Education and Culture Minister M Nuh, Home Affairs Minister Gamawan Fauzi, Yogyakarta Governor Sri Sultan Hamengku Buwono X and a number of district heads from the two provinces.
Chairman of Apdesis central executive board, Suhardi stated that the seminar will discuss efforts to familiarize the Indonesian people with Law No. 6/2014 on Villages and Law No. 24/2013 on Demographic Administration.
"We express gratitude to Mr. President for the village law. With the enactment of this law, we hope support for village administrations will increase for the sake of village development," he pointed out.
To that end, he expressed hope that village fund allocation of an average Rp1.4 billion for each village across the country will be realized in the revised 2014 state budget or the 2015 state budget. (*)
Editor: Heru Purwanto
Copyright © ANTARA 2014
