The government will sell Rp 2 trillion (US$222 million) worth of sukuk (Islamic bonds) in a private placement to the Religious Affairs Ministry’s haj fund, a senior Finance Ministry official said.
Speaking to journalists in Jakarta on Thursday evening, Finance Ministry Director General of Debt Management Rahmat Walujanto said this would be the fourth series of sukuk especially designed for the haj fund.
He said that since January this year, the government had raised Rp 2.86 trillion from the issuance of haj sukuk, more than half of this year’s target of Rp 4.86 trillion.
The total haj sukuk issued by the government since its introduction in 2009 has reached Rp 10.78 trillion.
The special placement was part of a memorandum of understanding signed by the Religious
Affairs Ministry and the Finance Ministry in April last year amid growing criticism over the haj fund, which manages trillions of rupiah deposited by more than a million potential pilgrims on the waiting list.
Finance Ministry Director of Islamic Financing Dahlan Siamat said the government would launch the latest series of the haj sukuk (SDHI) after the Idul Fitri holiday.
Dahlan said the sale was part of the government’s program to plug the budget deficit, which is estimated at Rp 133.7 trillion, or 2.1 percent of gross domestic product (GDP).
Dahlan said the sukuk specially issued for the haj fund would carry a maturity period of up to four years, much longer than other sukuk or treasury bonds, which usually offered a one-year maturity.
“For the government, a longer maturity is preferable. It is what we want,” he added. The Religious Affairs Ministry, he said, would not have problems with a four-year maturity because it often took more than four years for potential pilgrims to get off the waiting list and perform the pilgrimage. In the future, he said, haj fund deposited in banks would be shifted to haj sukuk.
The Finance Ministry said that as of Sept. 2, the total funds raised from the issuance of treasury notes including sukuk had reached Rp 162 trillion, more than 85 percent of this year’s target
Source: AJPAdvertisment
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