JAKARTA: Indonesia will decide the site of its new capital this year with the aim of it being ready by 2024, a minister said Wednesday.

The decision to move the capital from megacity Jakarta came about two weeks ago after President Joko Widodo approved the long-mooted plan.

The government is finalising studies so they can decide this year and start the groundbreaking project in 2021, urban planning minister Bambang Brodjonegoro said.

“We’ve been co-ordinating to finalise the studies so we can decide this year where to move the capital to, so the process and construction can begin in a year or two,” he said.

“So we hope in 2024 the new capital is ready to be the new government centre.”

Jakarta — and its surrounding satellite cities — has a population of about 30 million people and is regularly rated as one of the most traffic-congested centres in the world.

Annual flooding due to excessive groundwater extraction has also made it one of the world’s fastest-sinking cities.

Earlier this month President Widodo visited East and Central Kalimantan on the island of Borneo to scout for a new capital location.

Brodjonegoro said the only sites being considered for the new capital were “the two places we’ve visited earlier”.

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