President Prabowo Subianto is committed to building an airport in North Bali. According to him, this airport will encourage the development of the island’s infrastructure, as in Singapore and Hong Kong.
He conveyed this when attending a lunch with Balinese leaders in Denpasar on Sunday, November 2024.
“North Bali Airport, I have said that I am committed. I want to build North Bali International Airport. We will make Bali maybe the New Singapore, the New Hong Kong,” Prabowo said, as reported by Kumparan.
Prabowo assessed that the presence of the new airport would allow Buleleng to transform into the centre of a new tourism area, like southern Bali. Of course, this requires thought and hard work.
“Work hard, and we must dare to think big, dare to think that others say it is impossible; we prove it is possible, ladies and gentlemen,” Prabowo said.
Foreign media had previously highlighted the construction of the north Bali airport. As reported by The Straits Times, a Gerindra politician who refused to be named revealed that Prabowo fully supports the second airport project in Bali.
“Mr. Prabowo wants this project to be supported,” he told the Singaporean media on Monday, October 21, 2024.
Keep in mind that the North Bali Airport project became one of Prabowo-Gibran’s campaign materials when visiting Bali for the 2024 presidential election. This project is also part of the priority program of the Bali governor-deputy governor candidate, Made Muliawan Arya-Putu Agus Suradnyana (Mulia-PAS), in the 2024 Bali Pilgub.
2 Airports in Bali
If this project is implemented, Bali will have two airports. The second airport will be located north of Bali, in the Kubutambahan district of Buleleng Regency, about a two-hour drive from Bali’s capital, Denpasar.
The construction of this second airport is intended to reduce congestion at I Gusti Ngurah Rai Airport, which already exists.
President Prabowo also wants Bali, which is already known as a tourism icon in Indonesia, to maintain this status and continue to improve. He hopes this will be done by carrying out development based on maintaining Balinese culture.
By making Bali the new Singapore and Hong Kong, Prabowo wants Bali to be the spearhead of the revival in Eastern Indonesia.
Around 15.5 million visitors flocked to Bali throughout 2023, close to the level in 2019 before the COVID-19 pandemic, when tourism around the world practically came to a standstill.
