House under pressure to end closed budget discussions

The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

Pressure continued on Friday for the House of Representatives to open their meetings on the state budget to ensure transparency, in the wake of allegations of state funds being "traded" between legislators and local officials.

The deputy speaker of the Regional Representatives Council, La Ode Ida, said institutions such as the House and ministries took advantage of the fact that budget talks were not open to the public to engage in conspiracy and the sale of the budget.

"It is the system, be it at the House or at the Ministry of Finance, which limits information to a few people. This paves the way for some people to perform so-called 'bridging' tasks between the central and local administrations," he said.

La Ode was commenting on the recent scandal involving the state budget, including the sale of postdisaster relief funds, allegedly involving House budgetary committee members who asked for bribes from local officials to help disburse or increase allotted funds for their regions.

Local officials, said La Ode, unfortunately get caught up in the system, offering bribes and later embezzling the funds.

"We cannot blame just the House for this practice. We also have the institutions in Jakarta and local officials themselves," he said.

La Ode said he was told by a local official that he had once been asked by a current House member to pay a 10 percent fee for the disbursement of funds.

"I call on all officials to report such cases to the authorities. Let us use this to push the central institutions to be transparent, although I personally doubt that many will (report the cases) because they are also involved in embezzling funds," he said.

Those areas approached by House members or brokers, said La Ode, usually had limited local funds but relatively good networks of businesspeople.

Legislator Suryama M. Sastra shared La Ode's view, and submitted on Friday to the House leadership a proposal to amend the House regulations to open as many meetings as possible to the public.

"The House must immediately take substantial steps that demonstrate its will to minimize abuses in deliberating the state budget. It is imperative that the House makes sure that all budget talks are open to the public," he said.

The House legislative body is currently deliberating whether it will review its regulations concerning opening meetings to the public.

According to current regulations, all meetings or sessions by the House budgetary committee are open to the public unless declared closed. But the fact is that the meetings are always closed.

"In addition, there must never be any official meetings between the House and outsiders held outside the House building. There must be no more backroom deals," said Suryama.