Irregularities continue as govt fails to act: BPK

Irregularities continue as govt fails to act: BPK

Annastashya Emmanuelle, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

Although the government has constantly vowed to eradicate graft
and corruption, the level of budget malfeasance remains high as
action is rarely taken by the relevant government institutions to
follow up on reports of irregularities released by the Supreme
Audit Agency (BPK).

"There is no significant difference in the percentage of
budget irregularities under the previous governments and the
present one," BPK chairman Satrio B. Judono told reporters after
a meeting with Vice President Hamzah Haz.

"It's clear that there's still not much being done to follow
up on our reports (of misuse of funds) ... we still find the same
irregularities occurring repeatedly," he said, adding that his
agency found most of the irregularities occurred in logistics
sections of virtually all departments.

In its latest report, the BPK unveiled 1,076 cases of
irregularities in the budget resulting in Rp 2.8 trillion (around
US$280 million) in losses to the state.

The report, which was submitted to the House of
Representatives (DPR) in March, revealed irregularities worth
over Rp 1 trillion in the country's state-owned enterprises in
2001.

Regional administration budgets (APBD) came in second with 302
cases resulting in state losses worth Rp 177 billion.

Most of the irregularities, totaling 450 cases, were
categorized as "deviations from the law" followed by "deviations
from objectives", which totaled 321 cases

The BPK's duty is to provide reports following audits of
government institutions. It is then up to the respective
department to examine and correct the irregularities.

"Follow-up are the responsibility of those who are being
audited, which is the government. Therefore it is up to the
government to make changes," Satrio said.

Prior to the submission of the BPK's report to the House, the
State Development Finance Controller (BPKP) reported incidents of
misappropriation involving Rp 2.5 trillion of state funds in
2001.

Satrio said on Wednesday that BPKP and his agency's duties
often overlapped. Nevertheless, the BPK was currently short of
the human resources and funds it needed to work effectively.

Regarding the disputed Rp 30 billion taken from the
Presidential Assistance Fund (Banpres) that was donated by
President Megawati Soekarnoputri for the renovation of military
and police accommodation, Satrio said that monies from the fund
should not be used before it was included in the state budget
(APBN).

"The assistance fund should be included in the APBN before it
is spent," he said at the State Palace after meeting President
Megawati Soekarnoputri.

According to Satrio, during the presidency of Abdurrahman
Wahid, his agency recorded Rp 540 billion in presidential
assistance funds held by the State Secretariat.

At that time, the Minister of Finance instructed all non-
budgetary funds to be included in the APBN.

"The last time we audited the State Secretariat was in June
2000. In the near future, we will examine this institution and
then we will see whether the fund has been included in the state
budget or not," he said.