Transformation of corruption

Transformation of corruption

This is the second of two articles on corruption by Teten
Masduki, coordinator of the Jakarta-based Indonesian Corruption
Watch.

JAKARTA (JP): The outcome of the last election may have
strengthened the old forces, after apparently successfully
repositioning themselves in new institutions during Habibie's
administration.

Obviously, we cannot expect the political elite to come up
with an agenda to wipe out graft because they are the main
perpetrators. As shown in Singapore and Hong Kong, graft
elimination requires a role model from the top.

The great attention that the legislature has paid to the two
money scandals allegedly involving the president is more an
attempt to use graft issues as a means of character assassination
to weaken Gus Dur's position -- rather than the real commitment
of the House to eradicate graft.

Major graft cases or the failure of Gus Dur's administration
in doing away with graft have never been included in the House's
main agenda of discussion.

Instead of paying utmost attention to wiping out corruption,
Gus Dur himself has instead obstructed law enforcement with his
open protection of three debt-ridden business tycoons (Marimutu
Sinivasan, Syamsul Nursalim and Prajogo Pangestu) or his meeting
with Tommy Soeharto, then already a convict.

The appointment of Marzuki Darusman, a Golkar cadre and smart
politician, as the attorney general, clearly indicates that Gus
Dur has basically extended protection against punishment to the
three main pillars of the New Order (minus Soeharto), namely
business tycoons, political bureaucrats and generals.

In the Cabinet, not a single minister can morally claim
integrity to be able to create zero corruption in their own
offices. Therefore, the approach of an island of integrity aiming
for good governance, introduced by Transparency International,
the International Monetary Fund and other international financial
institutions, cannot be applied here.

This means few, if any at the elite level, dare risk losing
their positions when they go against the grains.

A corrupt political society has left no option to the anti-
graft movement but to concentrate on empowering the civil
society, mainly in pressurizing the government, political parties
and the legislature to show greater accountability, and change
the political behavior of the corrupt elite.

A new political structure obviously needs change in the
general election system, and there must be a guarantee that
people's representatives will show greater accountability.

Political parties must hence cleanse themselves from dirty
politicians; or they will lose votes in the next election.

Also, these parties are expected to adopt a public
accountability system, which will enable the people to remove
legislators and replace a government betraying their trust.

This means a broader corridor for community participation in
public decision making, supervision and law enforcement. The
people's right to access information on officials and to obtain
protection for the right to control these officials must be
guaranteed in the laws, to prevent possibility of retaliation.

Legal reform to facilitate the trial of those engaged in graft
is urgent. This August the government will set up a Commission on
Graft Eradication, an agency given vast authority to carry out
investigation and prosecution, as regulated in Law No. 31/1999 on
graft eradication.

This commission may substitute the prosecutor's office and the
police, which have proved non-functional in wiping out graft.

However, bad experience in the set up of the state official
wealth commission justifies fears that the above Commission will
be so much influenced by political interests that it will fail to
function from the very start.

Besides, a special procedural code on courts trying graft
cases must be established. In this context the principle of
reverse evidence must be adopted because the conventional
procedural code not only proves ineffective in such cases, but
also opens opportunities for the prosecutor or the police to
collude with the suspect to avoid a trial.

The courts must hence must comprise selected judges
uncontaminated by the mafia-like practices in our judicial
system.

Social sanctions imposed on those engaged in graft practices
can actually fill the gap left by legal sanctions.

However social ostracism is not easy in a community still
highly tolerant towards deviant behavior. People have indeed
taken the law into their own hands in theft cases found in their
own sphere, sometimes very savagely.

However, they may not do the same thing towards people engaged
in graft although these people may cause suffering on a larger
scale. The latter are unlikely close to them; or the definition
of graft has been euphemistically transformed, making its
criminal nature vague.

Former President Soeharto may be an exception. He would have
been tried by the students endlessly staging rallies around his
residence, had it not been for barricades put up by the military.

A further constraint to wiping out graft is, unfortunately,
the media practice of unwittingly allotting respectable space to
dirty officials of the old regime now assuming a new image.