Team to probe bribe problem in judicial system
JAKARTA (JP): The Supreme Court and the Ministry of Justice will form a special team to investigate allegations that many judges have tainted the judiciary system by accepting bribes.
Chief Justice Soerjono said yesterday the team will make an inquiry into allegations made by former deputy chief justice Zaenal Asikin Kusumah-Atmadja, who said that many judges took bribes.
If necessary, Asikin will be invited to provide data that could support his statement, Soerjono added.
Asikin was quoted by Kompas daily as saying that up to 50 percent of judges in the country took bribes and that collusion in the court system was controlled by what he called a "court mafia".
"How could he give that figure? On what basis did he say that?" asked Soerjono, who was accompanied by Ali Boediarto, the secretary-general of the Indonesian Judges' Association (Ikahi).
Asikin earlier made headlines with his daring decision in favor of villagers who had to give up their land for the construction of the Kedungombo dam in Central Java. The Supreme Court then ordered the governor to pay Rp 50,000 (US$23) per square meter of property in addition to "immaterial compensation" amounting to Rp 2 billion to each plaintiff.
The Supreme Court later reviewed the case upon the request of the governor, after which then chief justice, Purwoto S. Gandasubrata, annulled the decision.
Soerjono rejected the term "court mafia", saying that mafia referred to organized crime.
Purwoto, who retired last month, had the same objection to the term. "It is collusion between irresponsible individuals," he insisted.
He admitted that some judges may have violated laws, but the number was much lower than what Asikin suggested.
Independent
Baharuddin Lopa, Secretary-General of the National Commission of Human Rights, said the team in charge of inquiring into the bribery allegations must be independent. He also suggested that the team members must be "clean".
Soerjono, Purwoto and Lopa made the comments during a break in a seminar on law held by the Forum Keadilan biweekly magazine and Ikahi.
The issue of bribery in court was discussed in the first session of the seminar, which featured Lopa, Loebby Loqman, a professor in law from the University of Indonesia, and Yahya Harahap, a Supreme Court justice.
Lopa pointed out that bribery in court had become more and more organized.
Lopa said that in the past it was known that people offered bribe money at the judges' house. Today, the colluding parties do not necessarily have to meet as they can use the services of middlemen. The amount of the bribe is also set in a more direct manner, he added.
"In short, it has become a business," he said.
He said even though the court did not always favor the rich, there is a tendency for poor people to lose their legal battles. As a result, people have become skeptical about law enforcement and reluctant to deal with law enforcers, according to Lopa, who once worked as a provincial prosecutor's office chief.
He also criticized lawyers for contributing to the negative image of the judiciary by offering bribes to law enforcers.
Judges should improve their moral integrity, as well as their professionalism, in order to clear away their tainted image, he said.
Lopa criticized judges who based their verdicts solely on what he called "formal truth" without considering the social aspects.
"A good decision considers the social milieu," he said.
He observed that in land cases a lot of poor people, who had tilled the land in dispute for years, lost the legal battle because they failed to show the court the official documents that they never had.
On the other hand, rich people can easily obtain documents with money and then claim that they had the right to the land, Lopa charged.
"From social point of view, it is the farmers who have the right to the land, but from the judicial point of view the rights go to the conglomerates," he said. (sim)