Judiciary system untouched by political reform

The controversial decision by a Jakarta district court earlier this week to free a suspect linked to a major corruption case has angered many legal observers. Corporate lawyer T. Mulya Lubis urges an immediate overhaul of Jakarta's courts and the dismissal of all bad judges.

Question: How do you see the South Jakarta District Court's decision earlier this week to drop all charges against businessman Djoko S. Tjandra?

Answer: The decision to free the main suspect in the high- profile Bank Bali scandal was a fatal one. It was a setback (for justice) and a deadly blow to the government's efforts to revamp the legal system. This shows that our judiciary has not been touched by political reform.

Judges work under their profession's immunity, but does immunity equal impunity? This is a key question because the work of the judges has for 30 years been widely suspected of (being tainted by) extreme corruption, hence the term "court mafia". This kind of work has been carried out with unlimited impunity, similar to that of the military which was untouchable throughout all those years.

It is time to break up once and for all the iron chain of impunity. It is as if the judges have no one to control them. Who guards the guardians?

Isn't criticism of the judiciary an old song?

It is true, but the criticism has been overturned by the judges' doctrine of autonomy. The judiciary turns out to be the hardest to bend compared to the two other pillars of politics. Foreign investors have never wanted their disputes settled in the courts. This has been so for a long time.

You said the South Jakarta court's decision was a fatal one, why is that?

The prosecutor's indictment was based on criminal law in which Tjandra and his accomplices were accused of robbing the state's coffers. He made a cessie contract between PT Era Giat Prima (EGP), of which he is an executive, and Bank Bali to help the bank recoup a huge sum of money in interbank claims on closed banks under the control of the Indonesian Bank Restructuring Agency (IBRA).

But apart from the contract EGP did nothing else, since it was Bank Bali itself which eventually collected the money from Bank Indonesia and transferred Rp 546 billion (US$73.7 million) out of Rp 904 billion to EGP. The cessie contract was by then already declared illegal by IBRA.

If judges failed to fairly respond to such a widely publicized case as Bank Bali, no foreign investor will want to invest in Indonesia. This is what I call a fatal decision, which is also an act of sabotage against President Abdurrahman Wahid's tireless efforts to bring back foreign investors to Indonesia.

What can be done to revamp the judiciary?

Investigate all the judges suspected of abusing their power. Former deputy chief justice Adi Andojo said a few years back he suspected foul play in a Supreme Court decision implicating another chief justice.

We can start from here and clean the Jakarta district courts of bad judges because the capital is the main gateway to Indonesia. Businesses come through Jakarta, most business disputes are in Jakarta.

A total revamp of Jakarta's district courts is therefore a prerequisite. It is time to substitute all the bad judges in Jakarta with ones with integrity. Otherwise, Jakarta will become a bad dream for foreign investors.

Is there anything that can be done to overturn the controversial South Jakarta District Court decision?

We can still correct the indictment in the case. But I also urge an overall assessment of the quality of past controversial court decisions which disturbed the public's conscience, including the decision on Tjandra.

There were numerous such cases in the past, among them cases involving Beddu Amang, Gelael, Tommy Soeharto, Rudy Ramli. Why? Because this is a disinvestment to Indonesia. The assessments should be carried out by people with integrity, not from the circle of judges but from academia, say three law professors from noted universities and two legal professionals.

They should be tasked to look for any absurdities in controversial court decisions.

How do you see the resistance to a candidate nominated by President Abdurrahman to head the Supreme Court?

IKAHI (Association of Indonesian Judges)'s rejection of a nominee who is an outsider demonstrates the Supreme Court's attitude toward legal reform. This is a dangerous attitude bordering on oligarchy, which is contrary to the practice in many other countries.

In Europe, judges come from the academic world and the circle of legal professionals. They have rich knowledge and experience and becoming a judge is an honor and recognition. Being a justice is the apex of one's achievements. Here, becoming a judge is part of the career path. Therefore, a judge's integrity and capacity is often questionable.

What about punishment for bad judges, given the sorry state of the judiciary over the last 30 years?

There is almost none. A few judges were either dropped or moved to other places in the 1980s. But that was about all. And this is in a country which has one of the highest rates of judicial corruption, according to Transparency International. One can only imagine what kind of picture one will get in a country where a judge being tried or punished is virtually unheard of. (hbk)