President Prabowo Subianto departed from Jakarta to Sumatra on Monday morning (December 1) to inspect areas hit by floods and landslides across three provinces on the island—Aceh, North Sumatra, and West Sumatra.
His first destination was North Sumatra. According to the Presidential Secretariat, Prabowo left Halim Perdanakusuma Air Base at around 6 a.m. WIB earlier today.

The President landed at Raja Sisingamangaraja XII Airport in North Tapanuli, North Sumatra.

During the visit, Prabowo is scheduled to directly review field conditions, including locations with severe damage and disruptions to essential public services.

He will also assess whether emergency measures have been implemented according to the standards of rapid, accurate, and well-coordinated disaster response.

In an official statement, the government has begun preparing recovery efforts for basic infrastructure, including road access, bridges, energy, telecommunications, and healthcare services. Prabowo also urged all relevant agencies to work swiftly to minimize the impact of the disaster.

The government has advised the public to stay alert and follow instructions from authorities on the ground, given the potential for continuing extreme weather.

During the trip, President Prabowo was accompanied by Minister of State Secretary Prasetyo Hadi and Cabinet Secretary Lt. Col. Teddy Indra Wijaya.

According to the latest data from the National Disaster Management Agency (BNPB), as of Sunday afternoon (Nov 30), the provisional death toll from the floods and landslides affecting North Sumatra, West Sumatra, and Aceh has reached 442 people.

The central government has not yet designated the floods and landslides in the three provinces as a national disaster.

For this reason, the Aceh civil society coalition has urged President Prabowo Subianto to immediately declare the severe flooding in the three Sumatra provinces as a national disaster emergency.

“We urge the President of Indonesia to immediately declare a national disaster emergency for the massive floods that struck Aceh, North Sumatra, and West Sumatra,” said Alfian, Coordinator of Aceh Transparency Society (MaTA), in Banda Aceh on Sunday, as quoted by Antara.

The coalition consists of the Banda Aceh Legal Aid Institute (LBH), MaTA, the Alliance of Independent Journalists (AJI) Banda Aceh, the Indonesian Justice and Peace Foundation (YKPI), and the International Conference on Aceh and Indian Ocean Studies (ICAIOS).

Alfian explained that the floods and landslides in the three provinces have caused severe consequences, including fatalities, infrastructure destruction, property loss, and the paralysis of social and economic activities.

He added that thousands of residents remain isolated, tens of thousands of homes are submerged, and numerous public facilities—schools, hospitals, bridges, and national roads connecting provinces and districts—have been severely damaged.

“In several areas, transportation access has been completely cut off, which has prevented the delivery of logistical aid,” he said.

He further noted that the situation is made worse by shortages of essential goods, causing hunger among residents, along with power outages and disruptions to communication networks, which have hampered emergency response efforts.

According to him, these conditions demonstrate that the capacity of local governments is no longer sufficient to manage such a widespread disaster, especially with extremely limited fiscal resources, including provincial budgets—particularly in Aceh—that are inadequate for sustaining large-scale disaster handling.

Strong legal foundation
Meanwhile, Banda Aceh Legal Aid lawyer Rahmad Maulidin explained that declaring a national disaster emergency is supported by strong legal grounds based on Law No. 24/2007 on Disaster Management and Government Regulation (PP) No. 21/2008 on the Implementation of Disaster Management.

It is further supported by PP No. 17/2018 concerning Disaster Management under Special Circumstances and other related guidelines.

Therefore, the Aceh civil society coalition is urging President Prabowo to declare the major floods in the three provinces as a national disaster to ensure the state fulfills the basic rights of victims and affected communities.

“In addition, we also encourage the Governors of Aceh, North Sumatra, and West Sumatra to jointly request that President Prabowo Subianto declare a national disaster emergency,” Rahmad Maulidin said.

Previously, House Member Nasir Djamil, representing an electoral district in Aceh, also called on the central government to designate the floods and landslides in Sumatra as a national disaster.

He said the condition of residents in the affected regions is increasingly alarming. According to him, the floods have left many families trapped, cut off land routes, and hindered aid distribution from reaching all impacted locations.

“If it is not immediately declared a national disaster, I fear the number of casualties will continue to rise. With all due respect, I urge President Prabowo Subianto to set this status,” Nasir said in a statement on Friday (Nov 28).

On Friday (Nov 28), BNPB Chief Lt. Gen. Suharyanto explained the reason the floods and landslides across Sumatra last week have not been designated as a national disaster: they do not match the scale of previously declared national disasters.

He said that although the situation might appear dire on social media, the conditions on the ground are not as severe.

He added that Indonesia has only ever declared two national disasters: the Covid-19 pandemic and the 2004 Aceh tsunami.

“We don’t need a lengthy debate. The national disasters ever declared by Indonesia were Covid-19 and the 2004 tsunami. Only those two. Many other disasters followed—like the Palu earthquake, the NTB earthquake, and the Cianjur earthquake—yet they were not classified as national disasters,” Suharyanto said during a press conference on Friday (Nov 28), quoting detikSumut.

He added that the current situation also does not meet criteria related to the scale of casualties and accessibility to the disaster zones.