A tough task ahead
Even though only on a caretaker basis -- at least for the time being -- the government's decision to replace scandal-riddled Attorney General Andi M. Ghalib with his deputy Ismudjoko provides President B.J. Habibie an excellent opportunity to begin cleaning up the Attorney General's Office.
No doubt, this was also on the minds of some of the country's most prominent former attorneys, who on Thursday visited the Attorney General's Office to call for tougher measures to be taken against Ghalib and to express their concern over the tarnished image of the country's highest law-enforcement institution. As a bulwark of justice, the Attorney General's Office must be run by clean and competent people, as former attorney general Soegih Arto said on Thursday.
There is no denying the validity of Soegih's statement. The sad truth is, however, that over the past 30 years of the New Order regime, the Attorney General's Office never enjoyed a reputation for impartiality, fairness and justice among the public. However, this unfortunate image had more to do with the judiciary's political dependence on the executive branch rather than dishonesty on the part of its personnel.
In any case, never in the history of this powerful institution has the public reputation of the Attorney General's Office been as low as it is now. How this office plunged into the depths of disrepute is well-known by now. The Indonesian Corruption Watch released copies of bank transfers amounting to billions of rupiah to the personal account of Andi M. Ghalib, making it seem for all the world that the attorney general was abusing his office for personal gain.
Though Ghalib has maintained the transfers were donations from businesspeople to the Indonesian Wrestling Association, which he chairs -- a claim which has been corroborated by a number of the sports officials concerned -- the fact is that these claimed donations were in Ghalib's personal account. Moreover, some of the money came from two businessmen who not long ago had been questioned by Ghalib's office for possible violations of banking laws. Both of these businessmen's cases have apparently been "forgotten", even though similar cases are being pursued. To further fuel the suspicions of malfeasance, the concerned businessmen owe huge debts to the state.
Amid all this, President Habibie, who has the power to appoint and fire attorney generals, appeared reluctant to dismiss or even suspend Andi M. Ghalib from office. Habibie took the step of suspending Ghalib only after pressure for him to take action mounted. However, instead of abiding by the law and replacing Ghalib with one of his deputies, the President announced Coordinating Minister for Political Affairs and Security Gen. (ret) Feisal Tanjung would replace Ghalib, causing further public outcry.
While public accountants have been assigned to audit Ghalib's bank accounts, both experts and the public remain skeptical about the seriousness with which these corruption charges are being taken, particularly in light of the fact that the government has failed to assign specialized fraud auditors to the investigation. Furthermore, Bank Indonesia will not open Ghalib's bank accounts to auditors unless police formally name him a suspect in the investigation.
What this whole sorry affair has exposed is the gigantic task confronting the next administration before it can even begin to think of restructuring the social, economic and legal foundations on which Indonesia's new civil society must be built. To achieve this, the presence of a clean, fair, impartial and independent judiciary is an absolute requirement. It is unfortunate that instead of doing what it could to move this long process forward during the short time it had at its disposal, the Habibie administration has made the task that much more difficult.