An Orientation Day (Masa Ta’aruf) of Department of Governmental Studies of Universitas Muhammadiyah Yogyakarta (UMY) was conducted on Wednesday (29/8) under a theme of ‘Students as a Leaders for the Future’. One of the speaker of the orientation day was Regent of Dompu Drs. H. Bambang M. Yasin promoting local potential of Dompu.

The regent of Dompu stated that most of Dompu people are farmers doing dry farming from father to son. The dry farming aims to comply with needs of rice, soybeans, green beans, and corn. Bambang admitted that they are not prosperous yet. “Corps are sometimes not sufficient for filling people’s one-year needs,” he told.

In 2010, Bambang was elected as Regent of Dompu for a five-year period. He initiated to create a program of corn cultivation. It was not easy to convince people to undertake the program. Now, Dompu becomes the greatest area to export corn to the Philippines.

Besides, President of the Republic of Indonesia Joko Widodo immediately engaged in deciding a price of the corn to meet a national standard. Mr. President also went to Dompu to harvest the corn with the people. Since then, Indonesia stopped importing corn due to the program.

Being elected for the second time in General Elections 2015, Regent of Dompu still thought that economy of Dompu needs to develop. He invites all freshmen of the department to dream big and achieve it to foster community because the department is believed to bear leader cadres.

“To be a successful person, the foremost key is to focus. For instance, I focus on advancing and succeeding production of corn. Next, we have to have dreams. If we do not possess the dreams, we do not owe hopes and become pessimistic. Last, we should have controlled vigor. We have to be enthusiastic about achieving all of the dreams,” mentioned Bambang.