Takes two to tango
Abdillah Toha's article in The Jakarta Post, March 1, titled Extradition talks and Singapore's lectures reflects an Indonesian citizen's impatience regarding the signing of the extradition treaty that has been discussed over the past three decades. In fact, the majority of Indonesians, in my opinion, share his views.
Since the first request for Singapore to sign an extradition treaty in 1975 was submitted, there has been no progress so far, even though the United Nations Convention Against Corruption was signed two years ago, and the ASEAN Agreement on Reciprocal Legal Aid against Criminal Acts was approved last November. It was only after the Indonesian House of Representatives put pressure on the government to set the end of 2005 as the deadline for signing the treaty that the Singaporean government agreed to resume talks on it.
Indonesians -- who have not had an "explosive-style" leader like first president Sukarno for the past three decades or so -- should learn from former Malaysian prime minister, Dr. Mahathir Mohammad, and the current Thai prime minister, Thaksin Sinawatra, about how to talk tough when it comes to critical issues.
As we are all aware, Indonesia is currently the fifth most corrupt country in the world. Being a good neighbor, the Singaporean authorities should have, in the first place, known about and helped Indonesia in its fight against corruption by, for instance, preventing corruptors from hiding, and their graft money from being hidden, in their country.
Abdillah Toha's remarks have been "categorically" corrected by the Singaporean Embassy here (the Post, March 5), and they even asked for proof as to the amount of illicit money stashed in their country's banks. Well, according to reports there is presently about US$70 billion in Indonesian corruptors' money deposited in Singapore's banks (Kompas, Dec. 17).
From the business perspective, such huge deposits obviously have the potential to make the host country, which is already rich, even richer. But from the perspective of neighborliness, it means they are enjoying themselves while we are suffering.
The House pressure on the government has encouraged the Singaporeans to start talks on the treaty again, even though the latest round of talks does not offer too much hope as a result of Singapore's tactic of buying time. In order to add to the pressure and Indonesia's bargaining power during the next round of talks, it is worth considering the suggestion by former Garuda Indonesia president M. Suparno: that Indonesia revoke the right of Singapore Airlines to traverse Indonesian airspace, given that they earn $900 million in profit from their flights to Australia alone (Business Indonesia, March 1).
M. RUSDI, Jakarta