An uphill battle
An uphill battle
It is certainly gratifying to hear, straight from the horse's
mouth as it were, that fighting corruption is so close to the
hearts of our presidential election candidates. In all their
campaign speeches and statements, none of the five pairs
currently running for the highest posts in government neglected
to assure the public that fighting this by-now-ingrained social
scourge would be at the top of their agenda, should they be
elected.
In a televised campaign debate, President Megawati
Soekarnoputri assured participant Ikrar Nusa Bhakti that she
would suspend the governor of Nanggroe Aceh Darrusalam, Abdullah
Puteh, from his post, pending the completion of investigations.
By any measure, the corruption case implicating the governor
and civil emergency administrator of Aceh, is currently among the
hottest topics of public discussion here, and with reason. Before
he became governor of that restive westernmost Indonesian
province, Puteh was a prominent youth leader and, at one time,
chairman of the Indonesian National Youth Committee (KNPI). As
civil emergency administrator, he obviously commands a good deal
of authority. At present, however, the governor finds himself
implicated in a corruption case that has cost the state Rp 4
billion (US$5.4 million), allegedly by marking up the cost of
purchasing a helicopter for his province's administration. In
addition, he is implicated in a similar case involving the
purchase of a Rp 30 billion power generator for the province -- a
case that is currently under police investigation.
Circumventing details, on June 29, the six-month-old
Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK) named Puteh a suspect in
the helicopter purchase case and summoned him for questioning on
July 6. However, the governor failed to appear on that date,
citing a busy schedule, but promised to come three days later, on
July 9. Again, he did not appear. Apparently weary of Puteh's
maneuverings, the KPK in a letter to the President sent over the
past weekend, ordered her -- in line with the authority granted
to it under Law No.30/2002 -- to suspend the governor from his
post. The commission informed the President that it would use its
legal authority to force Puteh to succumb by July 14, today,
despite the objections of Puteh's lawyers, who say their client
will refuse to succumb until a pre-trial hearing affirms the
commission's authority to do so.
It will be interesting to see which course the case takes in
the days ahead. The government, for its part, appears reluctant
to act. For his part, home minister Hari Sabarno is reported to
have said that three main aspects -- administrative, political
and legal -- must be considered by the President prior to the
suspension of a provincial governor. And, what if she should
refuse to act? "That is the President's political domain," said
KPK chairman Taufiqurrahman Ruki: "The KPK has no authority (to
force her). However, we have tried. Let the public make its own
judgment."
It would seem that, in the long run, persisting to refuse to
comply with the commission's request -- that is, on Puteh's part,
to appear to be questioned, and on the President's part, to
suspend the Aceh governor from his post -- would do little good
for either Puteh or the President. The public, of course, will
certainly "make its own judgment" by means of voting in the
second round of the presidential election.
Nevertheless, it is the Indonesian public that stands to lose
the most. In an almost equally prominent case that came to light
earlier this month, Nurdin Halid, a lawmaker and chairman of the
Confederation of Primary Cooperatives Association (Inkud), this
week also defied a police summons for questioning in connection
with his alleged role in a sugar smuggling scam. Law No.30/2002,
by which the Corruption Eradication Commission was established,
is the strongest legal instrument yet to be produced by the
government and the House of Representatives. Being an independent
body, the commission is supposed to be free of the influence and
interference of any other institution. And yet, those two cases
show how challenging it is to untie the Gordian knot that is the
problem of corruption in Indonesia.
Given the situation, to hope that the election and
installation of a new president and vice president in the near
future will mean the immediate break of a new day -- in terms of
clean government and egalitarian principles -- is to hope for too
much, too soon. Nevertheless, the nation has no choice but to
persist in its efforts to rid social parasites and self-
interested leaders from society, or face the grim alternatives.