Illegal fees, common enemy
Most dailies in Jakarta on Sunday (June 26) published the staggering findings by the University of Indonesia's research institute in cooperation with the Dutch government and the World Bank. It was found out that illegal fees within the ministry of finance's department of customs and excise during the 2004 period amounted to about Rp 7 trillion (US$718 million) from importers/exporters in Jakarta, Semarang, Surabaya, Medan and Makassar.
The amount means Rp 583 billion per month, or Rp 19.4 billion per day that. If this fell into the hands of 20 persons, they would receive -- every day -- almost one billion each. They would, consequently, become very rich persons in a matter of weeks or months.
These practices occur because of the time duration needed for an export/import permit is seven days in Tanjung Priok port compared to three days in Japan, two days in Germany and the United States, and one day in Singapore. Such a long process has no doubt provided corrupt officials ample time to impose illegal fees, as they can detain goods unless they are paid these illicit fees. It proves that the oversight function of the ministry is nonexistent.
Presidential Instruction No. 5/2004 regarding the speeding up of corruption eradication does address in Dictum eleven point 2 that the minister of finance undertakes supervision on the implementation of taxation, customs and excise, and non-budgetary and taxation revenues in an effort to prevent leakage of state revenues, and to study the various regulations related to state finance that may open opportunities for corrupt practices and altogether draft the revision of the related bills.
In view of the above instruction, there is a need for the minister of finance to undertake an effective supervision of its directorates general of customs and excise and tax whose role in ensuring the country's economic growth is critically important. As regard investment procedures, the country is still the worst in providing such permits. An investor needs (on average) 151 days or around five months to get a permit compared to Vietnam 56, the Philippines 50, China 41, Thailand 33, Malaysia 30, Singapore eight, and Australia two days. Therefore, in order to improve Indonesia's standing in investment ratings, there should be a radical change in the way that such permits are processed. The government bill on investment that promises a processing time for an investment permit of only two weeks -- as stated by the new Investment Coordinating Board chief Muhammad Luthfi -- must be responded to by members of the House of Representatives (Republika, June 26).
M. RUSDI, Jakarta