Customs, traffic police the most corrupt: Survey<\/p>\n
The Jakarta Post, Jakarta<\/p>\n
The traffic police, customs and tax authority and the
\njudiciary were ranked the most corrupt institutions in the public
\nsector, according to a governance diagnostic study on Indonesia
\nconducted for the Partnership for Governance Reform by the
\nresearch center.<\/p>\n
The study concluded that corruption was seen as the country's
\nmost serious problem ahead of unemployment and the economic
\ncrisis.<\/p>\n
The study consisted of two parts covering the commissioning of
\n14 research papers on different topics related to corruption and
\nthe findings of a national survey on corruption aimed at three
\ngroups of respondents: business enterprises, households and
\npublic officials.<\/p>\n
The results of the survey and the research papers will be
\ndiscussed further in a series of workshops here starting on
\nFriday to develop the most comprehensive, effective framework for
\nan anti-corruption program.<\/p>\n
The survey itself, initiated last October and completed in
\nMarch, was conducted through face-to-face interviews with 650
\nofficials, 1,250 households and 400 business executives in 14
\nprovinces.<\/p>\n
The Partnership for Governance Reform is a collaboration
\nbetween several international organizations, including the World
\nBank, United Nations Development Program, Asian Development Bank,
\nthe Indonesian business community and non-governmental
\norganizations. It aims at pushing and supporting a governance
\nreform agenda with anti-corruption as its top priority.<\/p>\n
The survey was a semi-structured questionnaire containing a
\nrange of questions formulated to gauge the public's perception of
\ncorruption in the public sector, the legal system, corrupt
\nattitudes and behavior and general beliefs on the causes of
\ncorruption.<\/p>\n
Around 75 percent of all respondents regarded corruption in
\nthe public sector as very common, while 65 percent of household
\nrespondents reported actually experiencing corruption involving
\npublic officials.<\/p>\n
Other institutions ranked as highly corrupt were the tax
\noffice, the ministries of public works, justice, forestry and
\nimmigration, and political parties.<\/p>\n
All respondents ranked the news media, post office and
\nreligious organizations as the least corrupt.<\/p>\n
The study also found that the average number of bribes paid by
\nhouseholds appeared to increase with the frequency of contact
\nwith public officials.<\/p>\n
\"Corruption extracts a high cost from society with between 1
\npercent and 5 percent of household income, official salary or
\ncompany revenue spent on unofficial payments,\" an executive
\nsummary of the survey report said.<\/p>\n
The study also discovered that companies that paid more bribes
\non procurement contracts did significantly more business with the
\ngovernment than companies that did not pay bribes or paid only
\nsmall amounts.<\/p>\n
The high cost related to corruption was cited by business
\nrespondents as one of the main reasons for not investing in
\nIndonesia.<\/p>\n
Quite interesting though was the finding that 56 percent of
\nthe business respondents were willing to pay additional taxes if
\ncorruption could be eliminated, and of those willing to do so
\nover half were prepared to pay more than 5 percent of company
\nrevenues toward eliminating unofficial payments.<\/p>\n
This finding provided an indirect estimate of the potential
\nsize of tax revenue lost through corruption based on the
\nwillingness of companies to pay for the elimination of corruption
\nand was an indication of the fiscal cost of corruption to the
\nstate budget.<\/p>\n
The survey confirmed what has so far only been suspected,
\nnamely that public institutions had to pay in order to receive
\nbudget allocations. This diversion of funds reduced the amount of
\nresources available to the institutions administering the public
\nservice, thus lowering the quality of their services.<\/p>\n
The study made an interesting finding related to the recent
\ncontroversy over a number of state officials who reported most of
\ntheir personal assets as gifts from family members or relatives.<\/p>\n
Most respondents differentiated between gifts and money and
\ndid not consider gifts as bribes per se regardless of their
\nvalue.<\/p>\n
With regards to the causes of corruption, the three groups of
\nrespondents showed a strong consensus, citing low civil servant
\nsalaries as the main factor with the lack of control and
\naccountability of public officials as the second main reason.<\/p>\n
The study concluded that quality management practices in
\nprocurement, budget, and personnel processes backed up by strong
\nanti-corruption organizational orientation, limited discretion,
\nand the implementation of rules were found to be strongly related
\nto lower levels of corruption in public institutions.<\/p>",
"url": "https:\/\/jawawa.id\/newsitem\/customs-traffic-police-the-most-corrupt-survey-1447893297",
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"sponsor": "Okusi Associates",
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