The House still enable to take action against absentee members

A'an Suryana and Kurniawan Hari, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

Members of the House of Representatives (DPR) went into recess on Thursday despite much unfinished business and unmet targets, mainly due to a worrying lack of discipline and political rivalry.

Closing the current three-month session that began in January, House Deputy Speaker Sutardjo Soerjogoeritno of the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI Perjuangan) reminded the legislators that their poor performance had made them easy targets for public criticism.

"This poor performance and the severe lack of discipline among legislators may land us in hot water," Sutardjo told the House plenary session attended by 251 of the 500 House members.

Judging by the number of bills the lawmakers have endorsed over the past three months, the House's performance may indeed be categorized as abysmally poor.

House Speaker Akbar Tandjung announced at the outset of the current session on Jan. 7 that the House was determined to make up for its lackluster performance in 2001 by completing the deliberation of 24 bills by the end of March.

But by the time the House went into recess on Thursday, the legislators had deliberated and endorsed only four bills, including the money-laundering bill that was approved last Monday by merely 49 of the House's 500 lawmakers.

The legislators' failure to complete the 24 bills has raised doubts that the House will be able to meet its target to approve 80 bills in 2002.

Politicking is one the many reasons behind the legislators' failure to deliberate more bills. Ever since Akbar, chairman of Golkar, the second biggest faction in the House, was implicated in a Rp 54.6 billion financial scandal involving the State Logistics Agency (Bulog), the legislators have been so busy debating whether or not they should set up an inquiry to probe Akbar that they have had little time to deliberate the bills.

Political observer Chusnul Mar'iyah of the University of Indonesia said the House's poor performance was the result of a rivalry among political parties who are seeking the presidency in the 2004 general election,

The situation has been exacerbated by a severe lack of discipline among House members. More often than not, the chairmen of House plenary meetings has to delay opening sessions due to poor attendance. Most legislators fail to show up for meetings without giving any explanation.

"The laziness of the legislators is terrible," Sutardjo told reporters after addressing Thursday's meeting.

Sutardjo said House leaders had sent letters to the respective faction leaders in the DPR, urging them to punish absentee legislators from their own parties.

The poor attendance of lawmakers at meetings has prompted some to propose the setting up of a disciplinary committee that would evaluate the performance of each legislator and punish them if deemed necessary.

Hamid Awaluddin of the Hasanuddin University in Makassar said the establishment of the committee and the enforcement of penalties would help the House restore its tarnished image.

"Producing legislations is the main job of the House," Hamid told The Jakarta Post on Friday.

Hamid added that House leaders should publicly announce the identities of legislators who had poor attendance records for plenary meetings.

Others have gone as far as calling for the reintroduction of the recall mechanism, a method used by former dictator Soeharto to get rid of lawmakers critical of his policies.

So far, however, the legislators have not reached any agreement on the issue.

On Wednesday, after a tug-of-war, House leaders agreed to delay deciding on setting punishment criteria for absentee legislators.

"We are allowing each faction to determine the penalties for their own legislators who are absent from House meetings. House leaders will jointly discuss the issue after the recess," said House Deputy Speaker A.M. Fatwa said after a meeting with the leaders of 10 factions in the House.

According to Sutardjo, the recall mechanism should be reinstated to punish absentee legislators.

"A disciplinary committee is not enough as it would only warn absentee legislators. It would not have a deterrent function," he said.

Another House leader, Sutradara Gintings, however, rejected the suggestion, saying that the recall mechanism would revive the oppressive practices of the New Order regime, which had undermined the freedom of expression.