Judges give ray of hope in 'war' on corruption

Tertiani ZB Simanjuntak, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

With corruption rampant at all levels of the state apparatus in Indonesia, antigraft campaigners have often found themselves coming up against a brick wall.

But far away from the center of things, two judges in remote areas have dared to bite the bullet when it comes to corruption, something that so many of their colleagues seem loath to do.

Last September, a panel of judges presided over by Syamsul Qomar in the Singkil District Court handed down life sentences to three defendants, including a nephew of the local regent, for their roles in a graft case that defrauded the state of Rp 4 billion.

And in North Lampung, a panel of district court judges presided over by Irhanudin handed a one-year prison term to the Bukit Kemuning district head for embezzling Rp 125 million out of a Rp 400 million fund provided by the World Bank.

The sentence equaled that demanded by prosecutors, but the court added something extra: for each Rp 25 million in state losses that the defendant failed to pay, he would have to serve another year in jail.

Irfanudin and Syamsul were invited here by the World Bank's Jakarta office on Wednesday to share their experiences in attempting to uphold the law and eradicate corruption.

Both judges offer a glimmer of hope for a public desperate for justice after seeing so many high-profile corrupters evade the law and graft defendants walk free.

The Justice for the Poor Project Team, established by the World Bank's Jakarta office last February, has recorded seven major corruption cases across the country involving charity projects funded by the World Bank, mostly concerning the District Development Program (PPK), which is worth billions of rupiah.

Constrained by the letter of the law, Irfanudin said he found it difficult to counter a prosecution ploy that involved the presenting of weak arguments for the primary charges against the defendant.

In Indonesian trials, if the prosecutors have secured a conviction on the first charge, it is not necessary for the judges to enter verdicts on the secondary charges, no matter how brazen the alleged crime may seem.

Irfanudin testified before the participants of Wednesday's meeting that the Bukit Kemuning district head took out the World Bank money, which was allocated for development projects in his jurisdiction, before seven subdistrict heads in a locked room.

"Shamelessly the Camat took some money from the allocations for each of the subdistrict heads as his share ... He collected more than Rp 125 million," Irfanudin recounted.

Syamsul said that in his case he had decided to punish the three defendants to the maximum extent of the law as "they had caused anxiety in society and disrupted a development program aimed at alleviating poverty".

The prosecution had demanded 10-year prison terms.

"The stolen funds were worth twice the Singkil revenues," Syamsul said.

For Syamsul, being a judge in conflict-torn Aceh province means that he needs a lot of protection. Undercover police always guard him and he never sleeps at home. He also said he had to keep a low profile so he would not be easily recognized.

These stories, although providing some hope for the possibility of fair trials and reform of the country's judicial institutions, are not fairy tales.

Lacking proper controls and monitoring, foreign loans and grants extended to regional administrations are prone to corruption.

Worse still, corruption is also rampant in the country's legal institutions and judiciary, which are supposed to serve as the vanguard of the national campaign against crime.