ICW takes textbook allegation to KPK

ICW takes textbook allegation to KPK

The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

Indonesia Corruption Watch (ICW) alleged on Friday that
corrupt practices are taking place in the provision of textbooks
by local officials, administrators and legislators in four
regencies.

ICW reported to the Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK)
that its investigation indicated that regional autonomy had
allowed much collusion to occur among local officials of the
Ministry of National Education, regional administrators, and
Provincial Legislative Councils (DPRD) in book procurement in the
regencies of Garut (West Java), Batang, Semarang (both in Central
Java) and Sleman (in Yogyakarta).

According to the ICW Public Accountability Review, the corrupt
practices included introduction of local laws that benefited
vested interests, bribery, direct appointment of publishers
without proper tender procedures, sub-contracting without bids,
production of substandard books, price mark-ups, and book
rebates.

ICW's investigation, instigated by reports from local
communities, found that although education officials are often
seen as the main culprits, they were actually only executors and
victims of higher level bureaucrats.

Fatar of the Batang Budget Monitoring Forum explained that
collusion between bureaucrats and legislators was at the root of
corruption in many regions. "For example, in 2004 the executive
and legislative bodies of Batang regency agreed to execute an
investment loan worth Rp 21 billion for textbooks, which was to
be paid in installments over a period of three years. However,
existing regulation No. 107/2000 requires that long-term loans
can only be granted for facilities that produce income to pay
back the loan."

"The regent and DPRD of Batang also legalized the direct
appointment of PT Balai Pustaka to carry out a book publishing
project worth Rp 7.3 billion. However, Presidential Decree No.
80/2003 states that all projects worth more than Rp 50 million
must be put up for tender," Fatar said.

Prior to the late 1990s, when national government was highly
centralized, textbook production was monopolized by stated-owned
publisher Balai Pustaka. In order to assist the government in
decentralizing the provision of educational materials, the World
Bank provided loans to the Indonesian government to conduct
tenders to select book publishers across the country that could
provide quality textbooks for schools.

In September 2004, the World Bank stopped loans to 10
individuals and 26 firms due to fraudulent and corrupt practices
in relation to its Indonesian Book and Reading Development
Project. The World Bank said that the action was part of an
anti-corruption drive initiated by its President James
Wolfensohn.

Fatar, commenting on efforts at decentralization in education,
said that corrupt practices still existed even though the actors
had changed. "Now, according to our studies in Batang, the main
way these criminals act is through book rebates, which are signed
off by teachers."

In its report, ICW cited the provision of a 20 percent rebate
for textbook projects in 2003 to Batang administrators by Balai
Pustaka. The rebate, however, was not put into state coffers.

ICW's Public Service Monitoring Division officer Ade Irawan
said that price markups and reductions in book quality are also
very common.

"Despite price markups, the quality of books is substandard.
The paper used is very low quality, as many as 75 pages could be
missing from the books, and the book topics do not fit into the
national curriculum. This situation, however, is considered
appropriate by the people responsible for approving it," he said.
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