Govt slow in eradicating KKN

We are very much concerned with the fact that President Abdurrahman Wahid, or Gus Dur as he is popularly known, and Vice President Megawati Soekarnoputri have been quite slow in eradicating corruption, collusion and nepotism (KKN). After leading this country for more than 100 days, they have not had even one of the "looters" of the people's money incarcerated or shot dead. Even elementary school pupils can see that these "looters" cannot afford to live in luxury if they rely only on their formal earnings. This is a fact that law enforcers can actually use to arrest these people and make them account for where the riches have come from.

Even if we suppose that they are very frugal and have hardly spent their salaries, it would take them hundreds or even thousands of years to amass such huge wealth.

As measures to eradicate KKN will be widely supported by the majority of people, I herewith earnestly urge that Gus Dur and Mega should have the courage to apply "the presumption of guilt" in the case of these bandits who have engaged in massive corruption. Just arrest and imprison them and banish them to Nusakambangan and, if necessary, capital punishment must be passed on those involved in bank scams, morally corrupt business tycoons, former members on the boards of directors of state-owned banks, corrupt former New Order ministers and cronies of Soeharto. Allow them a week to prove that their wealth has been legally acquired and that they are not involved in bank scams. If they have authentic evidence to prove that they have not engaged in corruption, they must be set free and rehabilitated.

In this context, the lawyers who are very fond of echoing the "presumption of innocence" will surely oppose this idea because they will no longer get counseling jobs from these bandits.

We can imagine how many years -- scores or hundreds of years -- will it take us to get rid of corruption once and for all if we follow the logic of these lawyers. Even very transparent cases like those of Andi Ghalib, Bank Bali, Texmaco, BLBI, PLN, Pertamina and so forth can never be settled just because we are shackled by the principle of "presumption of innocence", a principle which can be applied only in normal conditions. Our condition now is that we are at the precipice of an abyss of destruction and can be rescued only with right and speedy measures of emergency.

So, our law enforcers, limited both in terms of numbers and capabilities, must not be burdened only by efforts to gather "legally valid evidence", which in reality is very difficult to collect.

H. WISDARMANTO GS

Jakarta