Indonesian private tutor Patricia has been learning German for two years, armed with a dream of leaving for Europe and driven by a lack of opportunities, economic stagnation and little hope at home.
She is one of thousands of Indonesians on social media promoting a popular hashtag that translates as “let’s just escape for now.”
Anger at the quality of life in Southeast Asia’s biggest economy — a nation of 280 million known for pervasive corruption and nepotism — has stirred student protests, and driven young and middle-aged professionals to seek jobs abroad.
Photo: AFP
“After working for so many years, my income remains about the same ... meanwhile my needs are increasing,” said the 39-year-old in the capital, Jakarta, who declined to give her surname. “I don’t own a house or car ... if I keep working like this, it will probably never be enough.”
In the past month, the hashtag has picked up steam. It has racked up thousands of mentions and reached more than 65 million accounts, analytics firm Brand24 said.
The outpouring has coincided with student-led protests against wide-ranging government budget cuts by Indonesian President Prabowo Subianto.
Savings have been channeled into a new multibillion-dollar sovereign wealth fund — that reports to the former general.
There were nearly 7.5 million unemployed people in Indonesia in August last year, according to the latest data from the statistics agency.
That has stoked anger against a perceived poor quality of life, as the divide between the emerging nation’s rich and poor grows wider, and the middle class is squeezed.
“After many strange policies and the change of president, I have shifted to feeling like I have to move abroad. It has become a primary necessity,” said Chyntia Utami, a 26-year-old technology worker in Jakarta. “I really feel it. I don’t get social assistance, and I have limited money to spend. Working is just about surviving day by day, month by month, not working with passion.”
Some Indonesians are taking more physically demanding jobs abroad to escape.
Randy Christian Saputra, 25, left an office job at a multinational consulting firm to do manual labor on a tomato farm in Australia.
“I’m tired of the system in Indonesia. If we look abroad, they usually have a better system,” he said.
Poor living standards in Jakarta encourage others to leave.
“The longer I stay in Jakarta, the harder it is because of pollution or traffic jams. It has more to do with the living standard,” said Favian Amrullah, a 27-year-old software engineer, who is leaving for a start-up in Amsterdam next month. “I am exhausted, and feeling hopeless.”
Some foreign companies are trying to capitalize on the trend, including Japanese recruitment firms posting online seeking to attract the most talented.
Experts said social media offers Indonesians an outlet where they feel heard.
“This showed the public’s emotion,” said Ika Karlina Idris, associate professor at Monash University Indonesia.
She said the hashtag highlighted “the public’s concerns about jobs and nepotism,” as well as at “haphazard public policies.”
The uproar sparked criticism from some government ministers. One even told those who wish to leave they should not return.
“Just run away, if necessary, don’t come back,” Indonesian Deputy Minister of Manpower Immanuel Ebenezer told a reporter last month.
He did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Pro-Prabowo influencers have also spread disinformation, aiming to undermine the credibility of protesters. A fact check team found more than a dozen TikTok videos pushing the baseless claim that student protesters are “paid,” which attracted more than 8 million views.
Pro-government and pro-Prabowo content creators then posted reaction videos amplifying the misinformation on YouTube and TikTok, garnering more than 2 million views.
Patricia remains undeterred, applying for a volunteer post in Germany in the hope that she can find a paid job once there.
“I want to fight there for a better job, life, a better income,” she said. “When I have a place there ... no, I won’t be returning to Indonesia.”
Kehinde Sanni spends his days smoothing out dents and repainting scratched bumpers in a modest autobody shop in Lagos. He has never left Nigeria, yet he speaks glowingly of Burkina Faso military leader Ibrahim Traore. “Nigeria needs someone like Ibrahim Traore of Burkina Faso. He is doing well for his country,” Sanni said. His admiration is shaped by a steady stream of viral videos, memes and social media posts — many misleading or outright false — portraying Traore as a fearless reformer who defied Western powers and reclaimed his country’s dignity. The Burkinabe strongman swept into power following a coup in September 2022
‘FRAGMENTING’: British politics have for a long time been dominated by the Labor Party and the Tories, but polls suggest that Reform now poses a significant challenge Hard-right upstarts Reform UK snatched a parliamentary seat from British Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s Labor Party yesterday in local elections that dealt a blow to the UK’s two establishment parties. Reform, led by anti-immigrant firebrand Nigel Farage, won the by-election in Runcorn and Helsby in northwest England by just six votes, as it picked up gains in other localities, including one mayoralty. The group’s strong showing continues momentum it built up at last year’s general election and appears to confirm a trend that the UK is entering an era of multi-party politics. “For the movement, for the party it’s a very, very big
ENTERTAINMENT: Rio officials have a history of organizing massive concerts on Copacabana Beach, with Madonna’s show drawing about 1.6 million fans last year Lady Gaga on Saturday night gave a free concert in front of 2 million fans who poured onto Copacabana Beach in Rio de Janeiro for the biggest show of her career. “Tonight, we’re making history... Thank you for making history with me,” Lady Gaga told a screaming crowd. The Mother Monster, as she is known, started the show at about 10:10pm local time with her 2011 song Bloody Mary. Cries of joy rose from the tightly packed fans who sang and danced shoulder-to-shoulder on the vast stretch of sand. Concert organizers said 2.1 million people attended the show. Lady Gaga
SUPPORT: The Australian prime minister promised to back Kyiv against Russia’s invasion, saying: ‘That’s my government’s position. It was yesterday. It still is’ Left-leaning Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese yesterday basked in his landslide election win, promising a “disciplined, orderly” government to confront cost-of-living pain and tariff turmoil. People clapped as the 62-year-old and his fiancee, Jodie Haydon, who visited his old inner Sydney haunt, Cafe Italia, surrounded by a crowd of jostling photographers and journalists. Albanese’s Labor Party is on course to win at least 83 seats in the 150-member parliament, partial results showed. Opposition leader Peter Dutton’s conservative Liberal-National coalition had just 38 seats, and other parties 12. Another 17 seats were still in doubt. “We will be a disciplined, orderly
RSS