Mr. Clean's crusade

Mr. Clean's crusade

The Indonesian Society for Transparency, which was launched
here early this week, is not organizationally related to the
well-known Transparency International, the Berlin-based
anticorruption pressure group. But the society's mission and its
work methods, as stated in its founding charter, will be very
similar to the noble crusade which has been conducted since 1993
by Transparency International, well-known for its annual
corruption score table of 53 countries.

It is hardly necessary to detail the background developments
that motivated the 32 senior citizens -- including former and
incumbent cabinet ministers, businesspeople, lawyers, economists,
senior journalists, clergymen, human-rights activists and a
three-star Army general -- to found the society.

Even now, more than two months after the opening of a
Pandora's box of the abuses of power under Soeharto's 32-year
authoritarian rule, we are still stunned to find how Soeharto,
his family and cronies had massively plundered the nation's and
state's wealth.

Society is quite right in its thinking that fighting
corruption is by itself not enough for the right, overall cure
for the social and political diseases left behind by the Soeharto
regime. An independent organization that is open to all citizens
and which is concerned about the future of the nation is needed
to organize a nationwide campaign to educate people on the
importance of public transparency and accountability both in
state affairs and in society, including the business world.

Former minister of finance Mar'ie Muhammad, respectably known
as Mr. Clean, who was elected the first chairman of the society,
should be all too familiar with how many of the decision-making
processes under the Soeharto administration were made secretly
and dishonestly for private gains.

But the society, locally called Masyarakat Transparansi
Indonesia (MTI), is different from the political pressure groups
set up over the past few weeks which make the political
monitoring of the Habibie administration their main mission.
MTI's mission also is much broader and its organization is better
structured than the Indonesian Corruption Watch which focuses its
attention on the recovery of assets perceived to be have been
illegally obtained by Soeharto and his family.

MTI will undertake research, workshops, case studies to
formulate and implement the broad concept of transparency in the
fields of law, economy, defense, security, social and cultural
affairs. It will thus emphasize the need for the development of a
system of national integrity.

It will closely monitor how public policies are processed and
implemented and launch well-organized campaigns to make
corruption and other forms of abuses of power a public issue
through mass media in order to exert public pressure on the
government and society to act against corruption.

Corruption has now become so global an issue that even such
multilateral agencies as the World Bank and International
Monetary Fund, which previously treated graft as an internal
political problem of a state outside their purview, have
developed a systematic framework for combating corruption in the
countries under their aid programs. Twenty-nine developed
countries grouped in the Organization for Economic Cooperation
and Development will enforce later this year the Convention on
Combating Corruption of Foreign Officials in International
Business Transactions they adopted in Paris late last year.

The worldwide campaign has been prompted by the findings of
numerous empirical studies that corruption cripples development
by undermining the rule of law and weakening the institutional
foundations on which economic growth depends.

Given the magnitude and urgency of the problem of corruption
in the country, and in view of the fact that corruption often
takes place in international business, it is highly advisable
that MTI immediately start networking with international
organizations and pressure groups already well experienced in the
campaign against corruption. Starting alone from scratch will not
enable MTI to gain the public attention that is badly needed to
jump-start the momentum for its crusade.

A partnership with Transparency International, for example,
would enable MTI to accelerate its start-up operations by
learning from the case studies, experiences, work references and
pilot projects already developed by the Berlin-based lobby group
and its national chapters in more than 72 countries.

All in all, though, MTI cannot by itself fully accomplish its
mission. The campaign against corruption should be undertaken as
an endless education process. It is a multifaceted drive to
develop a culture of high moral and ethical standards both in
government and society, including the business community. This
noble crusade actually is only part of grander things like
democracy, free press and open market economy.