Jakarta. The online gambling epidemic in Indonesia has little to no direct impact on Indonesia’s investment climate, according to a deputy minister.

The newly established Prabowo Subianto administration intends to clock an 8-percent gross domestic product (GDP) growth within the next three years. To achieve this goal, it wants to have foreign investors set up companies in the country, especially those coming from the technology sector.

However, amid an ambitious GDP target, Indonesia -- which is home to over 221 million internet users -- is seeing many citizens getting hooked on online gambling. Some employees have stolen their company’s money to place bets online. Several Indonesian government officials even got caught facilitating online gambling sites. Deputy Communications Minister Nezar Patria said the soaring online gambling cases would not make Indonesia any less attractive to foreign investors.

“I doubt [online gambling] has a direct impact on [foreign investments]. They are two different things. Online gambling is a matter of social pathology, but what’s important is for us to address online gambling,” Nezar told reporters on the sidelines of a US investment forum on Tuesday.

“We are partnering with tech companies to address this issue,” Nezar said.

The Communications Ministry has established a special desk aimed at cutting people’s access to online gambling sites. They have partnered with major digital platforms including Meta and Google, among others. Since Nov. 4, the government has banned at least 1,361 keywords related to online gambling on Google, and another 7,252 similar keywords on Meta, according to media reports. The government has blocked 104,819 online gambling sites in just two weeks on Nov. 4-19. 

Nezar said Indonesia’s tech sector remained popular among international investors. American chipmaker Nvidia has partnered with telecommunications firm Indosat to invest $200 million in building an artificial intelligence (AI) center in Solo. Nezar revealed there were also interests from Emirati and European companies, although he did not go into details on the names of the companies.

Nezar’s comment also came just a day after the police named 28 individuals -- nine of whom worked in his ministry -- as suspects involved in online gambling. These government officials had been making sure that the online gambling sites did not get blocked. They allegedly received Rp 8.5 million (around $533) per site for their services.

Official government figures showed that Indonesia had attracted Rp 1,261 trillion (around $80 billion) in combined foreign and domestic investments so far this year, as of September. About 51.9 percent came from foreign investors.

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