Yusril: Corruption Cannot Be Eradicated by Law Alone
Jakarta (ANTARA) - Coordinating Minister for Legal Affairs, Human Rights, Immigration and Correctional Institutions Yusril Ihza Mahendra has said that efforts to eradicate corruption in Indonesia will not succeed if they rely solely on legal rules and law enforcement institutions, without being accompanied by the development of ethical and moral awareness in society.
According to Yusril, Indonesia already has adequate legal instruments, ranging from legislation and law enforcement agencies to specialised bodies such as the Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK) and the Corruption Crime Court. Yet corrupt practices continue to occur.
“In my view, the problem is not the absence of legal norms, nor the absence of law enforcement institutions. What is missing is ethical awareness, moral awareness,” Yusril said while delivering remarks at the inauguration of the Cetiya Tian Shi Hua Guan Di Jing Se temple in Pantai Indah Kapuk (PIK), North Jakarta, on Sunday.
Yusril said his long experience as a minister in the legal field, during which he was heavily involved in drafting various laws and regulations, made him realise that law enforcement alone is not sufficient to eradicate corruption.
“I have drafted hundreds of laws. I helped create various institutions, expanded investigative powers, established the KPK, and set up the corruption court. But why, to this day, have we still not managed to eradicate corruption? In fact, it has grown worse,” he said.
He stressed that moral awareness cannot be built solely through the constitution or legislation, but must rest on ethical values derived from religious teachings.
“For decades I studied constitutional law, from an ordinary lecturer to a professor. But I know that the Constitution, laws, government regulations — whatever we create — mean nothing if the state is not built upon an ethical foundation that must be constructed based on the religious beliefs that live and flourish in our homeland,” Yusril said.
For that reason, he believes ethical education needs to be instilled from an early age so that future generations obey the law not merely out of fear of sanctions, but driven by conscience.
“If you asked me now whether building a state governed by legal certainty and justice, free of corruption, manipulation and bribery, can be achieved in a short time, I am pessimistic. I would say it may take one or two generations to instil this,” he said.
He added that building an anti-corruption culture must begin with strong character education, so that society has ethical awareness as the foundation for obeying the law.
“Let the current generation pass slowly, but we must start with education from childhood. In our schools, we must provide solid ethical teaching so that future generations are born that abide by ethics and law, not out of fear of the police, prosecutors or the KPK, but out of fear of their own conscience,” he said.