Jakarta. Presidential candidate Prabowo Subianto will not bring back the tax amnesty program and instead aims to enhance the tax ratio as a means to increase state revenue.

"Indonesia has exercised several tax amnesties. We will not continue that," Eddy Soeparno, a member of Prabowo's expert council said at a conference in Jakarta, on Tuesday.

Indonesia held its first tax amnesty program in 2016 and 2017, allowing tax evaders to come clean and declare their back taxes and hidden assets to the tax authorities, with only having to pay a much smaller amount compared to what they had to pay if the authorities caught them red-handed.

Even though the program was halted in 2023, tax revenue for that year surpassed expectations. Finance Minister Sri Mulyani Indrawati reported tax revenue for 2023 reached Rp1,869.2 trillion, exceeding the target set in the State Budget by 8.8 percent.

"Tax amnesty creates a sentiment where individuals feel they don't need to accurately report taxes since there might be a tax amnesty later. This imparts a negative lesson," he said.

Eddy said that Prabowo aims to increase the current tax ratio, which stands at 10 percent, without having to raise tax rates. The approach involves maximizing the number of taxpayers.

"We have a workforce of 147 million people but only 30 percent registered as taxpayers," he said. "We want to increase it to 50 percent," he added. 

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