Police force hit by acute sickness, Kusparmono says
Police force hit by acute sickness, Kusparmono says
JAKARTA (JP): A retired police general believes that the
recent extortion allegedly committed by a police subprecinct
chief is a reflection of an acute sickness in the corps.
"Officers such as he always have to arrange and prepare
everything when his seniors want to, for example, play golf at a
course located in his area," Maj. Gen. (ret) Koesparmono Irsan
told The Jakarta Post last night.
To make sure everything goes well, the officers normally "do
their best" to satisfy their bosses, he said.
"I don't think that I should explain this in detail," said the
former deputy national police chief for operational affairs.
Capt. Unggul, chief of the Serpong police subprecinct in
Tangerang, was detained late last month by officers of the
Jakarta Police Internal Affairs division for his alleged role in
extorting money from a 70-year-old suspected gambling operator
that had been arrested.
Reports said that the officer asked the suspect to give him Rp
10 million in cash and a 1,000-square-meter plot of land. In
return, he agreed to release the suspect.
Unggul was immediately dismissed from his post but the results
of the investigation remain unannounced.
"I have received no reports from the related officers about
the investigation," City Police Spokesman Lt. Col. Iman Haryatna
said yesterday.
According to Koesparmono, what Unggul was allegedly guilty of
was trying to satisfy the arrogance of some of his seniors.
"I exactly know who the arrogant officers are," he said.
The retired two-star general said that such arrogant senior
officers only phoned local police chiefs if they wanted to go to
the area to do something, mostly for pleasure.
Sometimes, the local officers have to prepare a big event,
such as a golf tournament which, of course, forces them to
persuade other parties to satisfy their bosses.
"These senior officers never give anything but they get many
things," he said.
"It doesn't happen all the time but I have plenty of
experience about this," said Koesparmono, now rector at the
police-sponsored Bhayangkara University.
He, however, hopes that the police, under the current
leadership of Lt. Gen. Dibyo Widodo, will be able to deal with
such sicknesses in the police force.
Dibyo, who was appointed national police chief five months
ago, has harshly punished undisciplined personnel on many
occasions.
"We don't want to keep any shoddy officers in our force," the
three-star general said recently.
In another related development, national police spokesman,
Brig. Gen. Nurfaizi, said that the recent suspension of the once
famous Jakarta police officer Col. Adang "was carried out at the
officer's own request."
"It's Adang himself who asked to quit the police force and
decided to work overseas," Nurfaizi told reporters yesterday.
Adang became famous for his alleged leadership in solving a
wide range of serious crimes in the city, including the murder of
noted painter Basuki Abdullah in 1993.
A reliable source said that Adang is now in Australia. (bsr)