Audit body seeks to shed

Audit body seeks to shed
image of toothless tiger

Fitri Wulandari
The Jakarta Post
Jakarta

The State Officials' Wealth Audit Commission (KPKPN), smeared
a toothless tiger, is seeking a legal basis to have dishonest
officials punished for providing false information or for
refusing to disclose their wealth to the public.

Deputy KPKPN Chairman Muchayat said on Monday that the KPKPN
had drafted a bill on the amendment of Law No. 28/1999 on clean
governance to include legal action against recalcitrant
officials.

"With the inclusion of clear legal action, KPKPN will be more
effective," Muchayat said in a meeting with activists of the
Association for Humanity and Justice (Humanika).

KPKPN has also demanded that the law stipulate a clear
definition on the position of state officials, no matter how
senior, to be audited.

Muchayat said the House of Representatives had agreed to
include punishments in the law that would provide the legal basis
for KPKPN, which was established in 1999.

Recently, KPKPN, the police and the Attorney General's Office
signed a memorandum of agreement on cooperation between the three
institutions.

So far, the commission has only been able to persuade state
officials to fill in audit forms that it had provided without the
authority to take legal action if they failed to do so.

The absence of a basis for legal action against recalcitrant
officials has been attributed to the low compliance in KPKPN's
request for wealth reports.

In February, the commission distributed 50,000 forms to state
officials to request that their wealth be audited. But as of
September, only around 7,800 of the forms had been returned to
KPKPN.

So far, KPKPN has announced the wealth of 2,504 public
officials. It has been verifying 175 of those reports and has
targeted 1,500 by the end of December.

Humanika coordinator Bursah Zanubi said the sluggish working
performance of KPKPN had raised concerns that it would remain "a
toothless tiger" in the drive to eradicate corruption.

"As a nongovernmental organization (NGO) that is concerned
with democracy and the eradication of corruption in Indonesia, we
are compelled to provide KPKPN with suggestions so that it is
able to improve its performance to promote a government free from
corruption, collusion, nepotism," Bursah said.

Humanika urged KPKPN to develop its ability to investigate
state officials who had amassed ill-gotten wealth in the form of
"grants" or "gifts".