Stop collusion in awarding projects, councilors say

JAKARTA (JP): Councilors and a contractor urged the city administration Saturday to stop the rampant collusion, corruption, cronyism and nepotism in the awarding of its development projects.

They argued that the time had come for the administration to promote clean governance in line with the growing spirit of political and economic reforms.

Amarullah Asbah, head of the City Council's Commission C for financial affairs, said the administration had for years been notorious for red-tape that spurred a high-cost economy.

"It's public knowledge that many projects are awarded without fair bidding," he said. "People wanting to participate in a bid have to deal with countless (people at) desks to succeed."

The administration should move fast to end the corrupt practices to improve its image, said Amarullah from the Golkar faction.

Lukman F. Mokoginta, head of the Indonesian Democratic Party (PDI) faction, said many projects were awarded to certain companies by way of engineered bidding.

"Projects are awarded through collusion, cronyism and nepotism involving officials," he said.

Such practices are rampant not only in the city administration, but also at other government institutions, said the member of Commission D for development affairs.

Lukman said the engineering of bids involved officials from the highest to lowest levels.

"The project manager, head and members of the bidding committee, head of the office or even the typist could be involved in collusion," he said.

He said contractors could obtain information about proposed projects long before they were tendered.

"A project plan should be kept confidential until it is offered for bid. But some contractors get drafts from corrupt officials even before the administration reveals its yearly budget in April," he said.

A contractor who spoke on condition of anonymity told The Jakarta Post that it was easy for someone to get a project at the administration if they had a friend or relative within the bureaucracy.

"It is common for officials, like the project manager or head of a department, to disclose a project planned for the next fiscal year to contractors they know well.

"It is common for contractors who have become part of the inner circle to be awarded a project well before it is made public. In this case bidding is a mere formality," said the source, who admitted that he had been granted several projects through such a process.

The formal bidding is attended by 11 bidders who already know who will be awarded the project. The one who is awarded the contract then cooperates with the 10 who lost out.

"We call them bidding associates. They'll lend you their documents to be used in the contrived bid. It is customary to pay dues of between 2 percent and 5 percent of the project value to be shared by the 10 companies.

"Remember that as a picked contractor, you have to pay 'thank you' fees to the officials. Usually we allocate 20 percent of the project value for them," he said.

He said bidding associates, who usually gather in a particular corner in the administration complex every day, were long-time partners of city bureaucrats.

"They (bidding associates) know full-well that they will always get lots of money as long as there are corrupt officials."

Amarullah said the corrupt practices had badly tarnished the city administration's image.

"The administration must get rid of these bidding associates," he noted.

According to Lukman, the council has tried to put a stop the collusion and corruption for years but the call has fallen on deaf bureaucrats' ears. (cst)