House launches debate on anticorruption body

House launches debate on anticorruption body

Bambang Nurbianto, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

The House of Representatives has kicked off the deliberation
of a bill that is being introduced to provide the legal basis for
the establishment of an anticorruption commission that is
expected to be armed with extraordinary powers.

House Commission II for domestic legal affairs on Monday held
a hearing with a number of organizations of legal experts and
non-governmental organizations to gather input for the
establishment of the anticorruption commission.

The Commission II chairman, Teras Narang, said at the hearing
that the anticorruption bill had defined corruption as an
extraordinary crime so that Indonesia needed a powerful
institution to deal with those implicated in it.

A recent Transparency International survey listed Indonesia as
among the most corrupt countries in the world with a score of
less then two out of an ideal score of ten. Other countries
scoring two or less include Azerbaijan, Bolivia, Cameroon, Kenya,
Uganda, Nigeria and Bangladesh.

The proposed extraordinary powers to be given to the
commission include, among others, the right to summon suspects,
to conduct investigations, to charge suspects, to impose travel
bans on suspects and the right to obtain information on the bank
accounts of suspects.

Sudirman Said, chairman of the Indonesian Society for
Transparency (MTI), stressed the need for the anticorruption
commission to be free of political interference as independence
would constitute the soul of its existence.

"If there are still political considerations in other
commissions, we sincerely hope that the anticorruption commission
will be free from such political interests," Sudirman said.

Teras said the formation of the anticorruption commission was
a must under Anticorruption Law Number 20/2001, which amended Law
Number 31/1999.

Those participating in the hearing included representatives of
the Indonesian Advocates Indonesian (Ikadin), Indonesian Judges
Association (Ikahi), Indonesian Jurists Association (Persahi),
Indonesian Corruption Watch (ICW), MTI and Police Watch, as well
as former justice Adi Andojo Soetjipto.

Adi said that since the level of corruption in Indonesia was
among the worst in the world, the effort to eliminate it could
not rely solely on ordinary legal means like the articles of the
criminal code.

"If we use the conventional approach, we will not be able to
fight against corruption ... Therefore we need a powerful
institution to conduct investigations," he said.

According to Adi, corruption in Indonesia was part of the
paternalistic culture applied by many Indonesians that included
such things as presenting tributes to superiors.

Such practices flourished during the autocratic government of
former president Soeharto.

Zakiyah, who heads ICW's legal division, underlined the
importance of the new draft law in clearly specifying the powers
of the anticorruption commission, thereby avoiding multiple
interpretations.

Zakiyah suggested, as an example, that the anticorruption
commission should be given the power to take over a corruption
case that was being handled by the police or Attorney General's
Office if it appeared that neither of the two institutions were
unable to solve the problem.