Foreign bankers

Foreign bankers

From Business Indonesia

With reference to a report in one of the morning dailies about Mr. Mar'ie Muhammad's proposal that foreign bankers be recruited to work in Indonesia, allow me to appeal to him that he not talk so much about this matter.

He is only proving that when he was a state official, things he handled became messy, and this messy state of affairs has remained until now.

Let me give one example. When Mr. Mar'ie Muhammad was director general of taxation, he was the one that heavily tampered with the law on taxation so businessmen could enjoy tax exemptions, or even if they should have paid their taxes, could always find a way around paying these taxes to the state.

Then he was made finance minister. Unfortunately, it was during his term of office as finance minister that huge credits were extended to former president Soeharto's children and cronies with the result that backlog loans now amount to a total of over Rp 200 trillion.

Now he is the coordinator of the team controlling the social safety net funds. Unfortunately again, he fails to account for funds allocated for the social safety net program (about Rp 8 trillion) but enjoyed by the wrong people.

Now Mr. Muhammad has proposed that foreign bankers be recruited to work in Indonesia. So, my question is why he does not propose that we also import a president, a vice president, ministers and other high-ranking officials. Where is his nationalism? Should we listen to his words?

ISKANDAR ZULKARNAIN

Jakarta