Forest Fires, Bundaran HI, and the Politics of Crowds: The Public Deserves the Full Picture
Forest and land fires are not a political stage. They are a real problem involving public health, environmental destruction, wildlife safety, and the responsibilities of the state. Yet when a disaster becomes the focus of public demonstrations, it is important to distinguish between the suffering that is actually occurring, the demands made on behalf of affected communities, and the political conclusions drawn from both. Democracy guarantees the public’s right to protest the government, but that right does not make every demonstrators’ narrative a complete representation of the national situation. Amid the gas masks, wildlife posters, revolutionary slogans, and crowds at Bundaran HI on October 28, 2026, the question should not be limited to what is being protested, but should also consider what facts the public needs to know before drawing conclusions.
Reuters reported that hundreds of students and civil society groups demonstrated in Jakarta and several other cities, calling for stronger action against forest and land fires, the declaration of a national disaster, and a review of government spending, including the free nutritious meals programme. The demonstrations are legitimate expressions of political opinion. However, the reported number of participants, the symbols used, and the forcefulness of the demands do not, by themselves, prove that the movement represents all Indonesians or that the government’s policies have failed across the board. Claims of public representation must be tested against broader evidence rather than inferred from the visual impact of a demonstration.
The disaster must be acknowledged, but the response must also be reported.
The scale of this year’s forest and land fires is indeed concerning. Government data reported in mid-October recorded approximately 202,000 hectares of burned land and 295,000 cases of acute respiratory infections across seven provinces. These figures should neither be minimised nor treated as an ordinary occurrence. However, a balanced assessment should also fairly examine government action, operational capacity on the ground, hotspot trends, law enforcement, and the outcomes of measures to protect affected communities—particularly as some aspects of the response have shown encouraging results.
On October 27, the Ministry of Forestry reported that the national number of high-confidence hotspots had fallen to 93, based on monitoring through the evening of October 26, down from 147 the previous day. In six priority provinces, the number declined from 26 to 10. The ministry itself cautioned that a decline in hotspots did not mean all fires had been extinguished; firefighting and cooling operations were still underway in several locations. Some of these figures also exclude weather-modification efforts, which have reportedly produced encouraging results, accelerating cloud formation and generating heavy rainfall in several key areas of Kalimantan.
These figures should not be used to deny the seriousness of the situation or to claim that the problem has been resolved. Rather, they show why developments on the ground cannot be represented solely through a single dramatic snapshot. A decline in hotspots is an indicator of progress that must be verified against actual conditions, the area still burning, air quality, and the continuity of firefighting operations. Conversely, the fact that fires continue does not automatically erase operational progress already achieved.
Law enforcement is a policy reality that should not disappear from reporting.
The government has also reported legal action against parties suspected of involvement in the fires. According to official government figures as of October 20, there were 100 police reports concerning suspected corporate involvement, 94 cases remained under investigation, and 13 corporations had been named as suspects. These figures must be understood according to their legal status: being named a suspect is not the same as being convicted, and an ongoing investigation does not guarantee that every responsible party will ultimately be held accountable.
At the regional level, Indonesia and Singapore have also agreed to establish a joint task force to strengthen cooperation in enforcing the law against illegal land burning. This indicates that the response extends beyond firefighting to include cross-border cooperation and efforts to establish corporate accountability.
Of course, announcing enforcement measures does not resolve the problem. The public is entitled to know how many cases proceed to trial, how many defendants are ultimately convicted, how sanctions are applied, and whether environmental damage is restored. But claiming that the government has taken no action at all is also inconsistent with the official record. An objective assessment must examine the adequacy of enforcement outcomes rather than disregard the existence of ongoing proceedings.
The budget debate should not be reduced to a choice between social programmes and public safety.
Protesters have also challenged the budget for the free nutritious meals programme, calling for it to be suspended or reduced to increase funding for disaster mitigation. This is a legitimate policy proposal for public debate. However, the relationship between these two budget allocations cannot be established simply by comparing their nominal amounts.
CNA reported that the free nutritious meals programme had a budget of Rp229 trillion in 2026. Meanwhile, Indonesia’s National Disaster Management Agency (BNPB) was reported to have a regular budget of Rp1.08 trillion and Rp4.62 trillion in readily deployable emergency funds. These figures raise important fiscal questions: Is disaster-response funding sufficient? Are funds distributed in time? Do local governments receive adequate support? And does the available expenditure produce measurable reductions in risk?
However, social programmes and disaster-management funds serve different purposes, operate through different mechanisms, and benefit different groups. Comparing their nominal amounts alone does not prove that one programme has directly weakened the response to forest fires. To establish such a causal relationship, critics would need to examine the state budget’s structure, actual expenditure, reallocation mechanisms, operational requirements, and alternative uses of the funds. A serious budget debate should evaluate the effectiveness of public spending as a whole rather than turn a single programme into a symbol of every problem in government.
Is this people power, or opposition mobilisation?
One striking feature of yesterday’s crowd was the apparent absence of university jackets or other campus insignia commonly worn by students during demonstrations, alongside the presence of numerous protest props that appeared to have been prepared with considerable effort. This observation is based on visuals circulating on social media; it does not, by itself, establish who organised the demonstration or what motivated its participants. The broader question cannot be answered simply by looking at crowds at Bundaran HI or in Yogyakarta. In political theory, the term people power should not be applied merely to demonstrations that appear dramatic or employ symbols of resistance to government policy. It also refers to broader forms of collective mobilisation, whose scale and significance must be assessed through participation, social support, and the public’s response to the government’s development agenda—including its technical approach to disaster mitigation and forest-fire management.
A political movement may begin with genuine public grievances and subsequently develop into political mobilisation involving opposition groups. The presence of a political agenda does not automatically invalidate environmental demands. Likewise, the existence of a genuine disaster does not automatically establish that a movement represents the majority of the population.
Claims that a demonstration represents the voice of the entire nation must therefore be tested against the breadth of participation, the diversity of groups involved, the consistency of its demands, and more representative evidence of public support.
Demonstration imagery can shape public perceptions. Gas masks, pictures of affected wildlife, presidential posters, and revolutionary slogans are forms of political communication designed to attract attention and convey messages emotionally. However, the public should not take the visual impact of a demonstration at face value without examining what the government has actually done. Dramatisation can draw attention to an issue, but it cannot substitute for evidence about the causes of the fires, government action, and the results of law enforcement relating to the issues being raised.
The public’s right to balanced information matters as much as demonstrators’ right to express their demands.
Reporting that highlights suffering and anger while giving insufficient attention to developments in the response risks producing an incomplete picture. Conversely, reporting that focuses only on declining hotspots or the scale of government operations while overlooking health impacts and continuing failures also falls short of responsible journalism.
Balance does not mean assigning equal weight to every claim. It means giving claims weight in proportion to the strength of the evidence, explaining context, acknowledging uncertainty, and assessing all parties’ statements by the same standards. The government must be transparent about both failures and progress; demonstrators must provide a factual basis for their demands; the media must distinguish factual reporting from political interpretation; and the public must maintain a critical perspective on all narratives in circulation.
Ultimately, forest and land fires should not be used to silence criticism, but neither should they be reduced to political capital in a battle over public image. The government must demonstrate that its response is becoming more effective and that those responsible are being held accountable. Demonstrators have the right to demand improvements. Yet no party should claim a monopoly on the voice of the people without adequate evidence.
A mature democracy is not measured by how dramatic a crowd appears, but by society’s ability to distinguish facts from conclusions, demands from representation, and political pressure from practical solutions. In the case of forest and land fires, the ultimate measures remain concrete: Is the burned area declining? Are communities being protected? Are those responsible being held accountable under the law? And can similar disasters be prevented in the future? These are the public interests that should take precedence over the pursuit of narrative dominance.
