Banking secrecy under trial

Banking secrecy under trial

Big businesspeople and key government officials with money kept in local banks are, at present, gripped by feelings of discomfort. The problem is, a private national bank has been accused of leaking accounts in the name of Attorney General Andi Ghalib and his wife.

Irrespective of whether this accusation is true, this case makes a bad precedent in our national banking business since it will cause other account holders to hesitate to keep their money in a domestic bank. They will, instead, be tempted to look to foreign banks as an alternative that they might consider to be safer.

It is the duty of Bank Indonesia as supervisor and custodian of the banking business in this country to investigate the matter thoroughly and then make the findings public so that charges of leaking can be proven.

We support the government's efforts to continue to enforce the existing regulations that commit banks to protect the confidentiality of their clients' accounts. However, it would be advisable that a law on money laundering be put into effect to help uncover cases of high-level corruption. Banks, after all, are financial institutions that are vulnerable to illicit transactions on both domestic and international scales.

-- Bisnis Indonesia, Jakarta