Rating on RI's corruption draws mixed reactions

JAKARTA (JP): The recent survey by Hong Kong-based Political and Economic Risk Consultancy Ltd (PERC), which rated Indonesia as the most corrupt country in Asia, has drawn mixed reactions.

Commentators like legislator of the dominant Golkar grouping Theo L. Sambuaga rejected the rating, saying the agency only means to discredit Indonesia.

Other commentators like economist Didik J. Rachbini from the Institute for Development of Economics and Finance and noted sociologist Arief Budiman question the criteria used by the firm to judge Indonesia as the most corrupt country in Asia. But they accepted that corruption in the country has reached an acute level.

"There is nothing new in the report," said Arief.

Theo said yesterday the criteria as well as the consultancy firm's motives were questionable. He suspected the firm made the judgment with certain business interests.

"The report does not detail how the survey was made. Thus, the basis for the assessment is unclear. This shows that PERC, like many research agencies which have lately thrived, exists only for certain business interests," Theo was quoted by Antara as saying.

The agencies, he said, discredited countries with big business potential like Indonesia to scare away investors.

"We need not feel perturbed by the report since its basis is unclear. But we really regret the statement," Theo said.

The report did not give a time frame for the survey, but 280 executives were surveyed and asked to grade each country on a scale of zero to 10, with zero being the best grade and 10 the worst.

Indonesia had the worst score of more than 8, followed by India, China, Vietnam, South Korea, Thailand, the Philippines, Taiwan, Malaysia, Japan, Hong Kong and Singapore.

"A series of high profile cases highlighted the extent to which politically influential individuals were able to arrange matters to their own benefit. Growing nepotism ... was thus probably equated with corruption," the report said.

The survey did not include any other countries on the Indian subcontinent, including Pakistan which was rated last year by a Berlin-based rating agency as the world's second most corrupt place to do business after Nigeria.

Didik and Arief told The Jakarta Post PERC's report was not new since many surveys in the past had pointed out the acuteness of corruption in the country.

However, both doubted the conclusion that Indonesia was the most corrupt country in Asia since countries like Bangladesh and Vietnam, they said, were also notoriously corrupt.

"In the Southeast Asian countries, we are certainly the worst. Corruption in the Philippines is also high but the country is still better than us in the sense that its media can exercise control," said Arief.

Didik said corruption in Indonesia had become an acute disease that took a long time to heal.

"We have had an anticorruption law since the 1970s. But it is a toothless tiger," he said.

Didik said the government needed to take multiple approaches in campaigning against corruption. The approaches include debureaucratization, deregulation, forming cleaner government and democratization.

Arief said the free press had a role as the main antidote against corruption.

A sociologist from the University of Indonesia, Paulus Wirotomo, said the report, however doubtful its method and criteria, would adversely affect Indonesia's image internationally. As such, if the government thought it was wrong, it needed to make a counter report which also had an international impact. (jsk)

Editorial -- Page 4