President Prabowo Subianto’s dismissal of Listyo Sigit Prabowo removes a Joko Widodo loyalist from the heart of his office as he faces a slumping approval rating and a battle to restore investor confidence amid stock market sell-offs, a declining currency and warnings from MSCI of an equities market downgrade.
Police allege that Listyo orchestrated unlawful surveillance of Prabowo, cabinet ministers, politicians, journalists, business figures and community leaders, without statutory warrants or a legal basis. Prabowo sacked him as presidential chief of staff on Wednesday, a day after police announced his arrest.
Listyo had led the National Police from 2021 under Widodo and was known as a loyalist of the former president. He is not related to Prabowo, despite sharing the president’s surname.
On October 1, Prabowo replaced Listyo as police chief and appointed him as his chief of staff on the same day. Listyo had served as police chief for five years before moving into the presidential role.
The alleged interception operation ran between 2025 and 2026, while Listyo was police chief. Asep Safrudin, the head of the Criminal Investigation Agency, said phone numbers were placed in the Lawful Interception Management System, or LIMS, without verification and with no connection to an official investigation.
Two other senior officers have also been named as suspects: Inspector General Ahrie Sonta Nasution, who heads the National Police Legal Division and was formerly an adjutant to the president, and Inspector General Eko Hadi Santoso.
In October 2026, the suspects allegedly ordered the deletion of audio recordings and logs from LIMS servers to conceal their activities. Personnel who knew of the deletion directive lodged a formal police report on October 30, 2026, setting the investigation in motion.
Listyo went to Bareskrim for questioning early on the morning of November 3, 2026. That evening, at a press briefing at police headquarters in Jakarta, Asep announced that the three men had been named as suspects. He said they were questioned over the “non-procedural use and access to the interception management system.”
Investigators have seized 11 mobile phones, one iPad and four flash drives, and interviewed 10 witnesses and three expert witnesses. The motive for the alleged wiretapping has yet to be determined, according to Yusril Ihza Mahendra, the Coordinating Minister for Law, Human Rights, Immigration and Correctional Institutions.
Listyo faces charges under Articles 258 and 332 of the Criminal Code and Article 32 of the Electronic Information and Transactions Law. Police said the alleged offences include illegal interception, unauthorised access to electronic systems and deletion of electronic information, carrying maximum prison terms of up to 10 years. The cumulative charges could expose the suspects to maximum sentences of up to 24 years.
Prasetyo Hadi, the presidential spokesman, said the alleged surveillance could amount to “treason” and endanger state security. Yusril called the case “a serious matter for the nation” that was “conducted against the highest office in the land.”
The Indonesian military deployed more than 20,000 soldiers in Jakarta on Wednesday. The military did not say whether the deployment was connected to the arrests.
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