Jakarta. President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo said Wednesday that Bruneian infrastructure company Brunergy Utama has not spoken with the Indonesian government about building a high-speed railway on the island of Borneo, even passing Indonesia’s new capital Nusantara.

According to news agency Nikkei Asia, iBrunergy Utama has proposed constructing the Trans-Borneo high-speed rail network. The two-phase project will connect Malaysia’s Sabah and Sarawak and Indonesia’s Nusantara, Samarinda, and Balikpapan. It will span 1,620 kilometers and will boast trains with speeds up to 350 kilometers per hour. Construction to link the railway to Nusantara will take place in the second phase. The entire Trans-Borneo project has an estimated cost of $70 billion.

Jokowi said Indonesia had not had any formal talks with Brunergy Utama regarding the plan. However, this is not the first time that Jokowi heard of the Trans-Borneo proposal.

“No [communications] yet. But I know that's actually an old plan,” Jokowi told the press in Jakarta, shortly after dispatching humanitarian assistance to Palestine and Sudan.

Malaysian Transport Minister Anthony Loke earlier this week also revealed that the Trans-Borneo project was still a proposal. Although there are plans to open up a tender for a feasibility study in May. However, the ministry has not finalized the tender documents, according to Malaysian government-owned media Bernama.

Indonesia is currently in the process of relocating its capital from the highly congested Jakarta to East Kalimantan. The project has attracted some interest from Bruneian investors. As a case in point, Brunei's investment consortium Ryada Holding Investment Group inked a letter of intent to build two housing projects worth between $300 million and $450 million.

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