Jakarta, customs top graft list

Tony Hotland, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

In the eyes of the business community, Jakarta is the most corrupt city and the customs service the most corrupt institution in the country, according to a survey by Transparency International Indonesia (TII), the results of which were revealed on Wednesday.

Of 21 cities/regencies surveyed, the country's capital was perceived to be the most corrupt by the business community, followed by the major provincial capitals and industrial centers of Surabaya, Medan and Semarang.

Getting positive reviews were the smaller cities of Wonosobo, Banjarmasin, and Makassar, which were perceived as being the least corrupt cities in the country.

The survey compiled the responses to questionnaires and face- to-face interviews with 1,305 business owners and top managers from local and multinational firms operating in the 21 areas.

The questions mostly centered around the need to pay bribes in order to obtain public procurement contracts and business permits, and also the level of satisfaction with the services provided by local government institutions.

"It's quite saddening that the ambivalence of local businessmen as regards bribery actually exacerbates the problem," said Todung Mulya Lubis, a member of the TII's board of directors.

The survey confirmed public concerns about deep-rooted corruption within government institutions, and served to back up a Transparency International (TI) survey that ranked Indonesia as the fifth most corrupt country out of 146 surveyed last year.

The 2004 Indonesian Corruption Perception Index survey, conducted between October and December last year, was conducted in cooperation with, among other bodies, the Berlin-based TI and the European Commission.

The 21 cities were selected based on a number of factors and discussions, including with the Indonesian Chamber of Commerce and Industry (Kadin), and were ranked on a scale of zero to 10, with zero indicating the most corrupt.

Besides identifying the country's most corrupt areas, the survey also said that the customs service, police, and armed forces were the institutions where bribery was most common.

A total of 140 respondents said they had to pay bribes to the custom service approximately 31 times per year, with the average amount paid each time being Rp 38 million (US$4,086).

Meanwhile, over half of the respondents believed that strict law enforcement with severe punishments for culprits were essential for eliminating corruption in the country, and were believed to be more important than higher salaries.

Therefore, most of them hoped the government would press ahead with the hard task of reforming the country's weak legal system.