Indonesia Arrests Officials Over Free School Meals Program Corruption

The former head of an Indonesian government agency, responsible for the rollout of President Prabowo Subianto's enormous free school meals program has been arrested by the Attorney General's office, following an investigation into alleged corruption.

The arrest of Dadan Hindayana comes a day after he was sacked as head of the National Nutrition Agency, or BGN.

Dadan Hindayana, along with two other officials from the agency, were led out of the Attorney General Department offices on Wednesday night in handcuffs and into a waiting police van.

The other two men arrested were Retired Major General Lodewyk Pusung and Police Brigadier General Sony Sonjaya, deputies of BGN who were also sacked on Tuesday night.

They were wearing pink vests, used by corruption investigators to identify someone as a suspect in a criminal investigation.

Investigators from the Attorney General's Office spent the day raiding BGN's headquarters in Jakarta.

The Free Nutritious Meals program, known locally as MBG, was a key election promise of President Prabowo Subianto, helping him storm to power in 2024.

The program, which is budgeted to cost about 270 trillion IDR ($20 billion) this year, has courted controversy, with one education monitor estimating tens of thousands of children had gotten sick from food poisoning.

The three men have been named as suspects in alleged corruption while carrying out their duties as heads of the BGN.

In a press conference, the Attorney General's Director of Investigation into Special Crimes, Syarief Sulaiman, said his office had evidence the men manipulated the procurement process and awarded contracts to foundations to run kitchens, when they weren't qualified to do so.

He said many of those foundations were owned by employees of the nutrition agency, including the three senior leaders themselves.

Investigators said they did this in exchange for kickbacks.

Tens of thousands of kitchens have been set up by foundations nationwide to oversee the ambitious school meals program, which aims to feed more than 80 million people across Indonesia, mostly children.

Investigators also alleged the men made purchases for the agency, including more than 21,000 motorcycles, more than 5,000 televisions and 32,000 pairs of shoes, that weren't required by the agency to carry out its duties.

State secretariat Prasetyo Hadi announced Dadan Hindayana's sacking last night, after an evaluation of the agency's performance.

"There are issues relating to discipline in implementing governance, including discipline in maintaining food quality standards, that should have been established by the National Nutrition Agency," Prasetyo Hadi said.

The men will be detained for 20 days while investigations continue.