General Maruli Denies TNI Is Involved in Tackling Street Criminals

Army Chief of Staff (KSAD) General TNI Maruli Simanjuntak has denied that his institution is involved in the crackdown on street criminals which is currently causing great public concern. Maruli stated that the accurate information is that criminals are now becoming fearful of the TNI’s presence in the community. “No, who is dealing with street criminals? No one is dealing with street criminals. Street criminals are just becoming afraid because there are soldiers, you know. Not dealing with them. If there are soldiers in that location, because there are street criminals, they see the soldiers and they don’t go through with it. It’s like that,” Maruli said after a working meeting at Commission I of the House of Representatives on Wednesday (10/6). According to him, in such cases, the TNI is only carrying out matters that are beyond the reach of other institutions or ministries. This includes the TNI’s involvement in waste management to agriculture. Maruli cited the TNI’s involvement in a number of projects in disadvantaged, frontier, and outermost regions, known as 3T, as an example. Because the project value is not large, but the implementation process is difficult, the TNI can get involved. “Because the project value is not large, but the work requires extraordinary transportation,” he said. He gave the example of a project on Nias Island worth Rp200 million. According to Maruli, the project did not involve the TNI from the start. However, because it required extra effort to complete, the TNI was permitted to assist. “So it’s not that the project was taken first and then we chose it, no. We only do what cannot be done by others,” he said.