Crooked politicians named in Bali

Crooked politicians named in Bali

Wahyoe Boediwardhana, The Jakarta Post, Denpasar, Bali

Five days before election day, April 5, Bali Corruption Watch
(BCW) released here on Wednesday a list of 14 local legislative
candidates deemed to be crooked politicians.

The anticorruption group urged the Balinese people not to vote
for them in the upcoming legislative election.

The Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P) had the
most candidates on the list.

Of the total 14 names on the list, 12 are PDI-P politicians.
The other two hail from the Golkar Party and the Democratic
Party.

"People can use this list as a reference before casting their
votes on April 5. Hopefully, they will not vote for these
candidates, who have betrayed the trust placed in them," BCW
chairman Putu Wirata Dwikora said.

The watchdog mentioned the names of all 14 politicians
concerned, but The Jakarta Post cannot publish them for legal
reasons.

Dwikora said the names on the list were all backed up by valid
data, documentation and testimonies, but added that some other
candidates had also lost their credibility.

"Therefore, people should not necessarily view other
candidates as clean politicians just because their names do not
appear on this list," he said.

All the listed PDI-P candidates were implicated in the money
politics scandal during last year's election for the Bali
governor.

Each allegedly received Rp 50 million (US$5,882) in travelers
cheques to vote for the incumbent governor, Dewa Made Beratha,
who later won the election with a sizable majority.

One of PDI-P's candidates on the list countered BCW's move by
questioning its integrity.

"Do the BCW people think that they are the cleanest people on
the island? The list is a fine example of finger-pointing by
different groups of thieves," he said.

However, he said that he would not pursue legal action against
the BCW, claiming that the list would not harm his image before
his constituents.

"It doesn't matter that the BCW is calling me a rotten
politician as my grassroots supporters still accept me as their
political representative," he argued.