Sutanto's anticlimax

The Jakarta Post ,  Jakarta   |  Wed, 02/14/2007 5:16 PM  |  Opinion

National Police Chief Gen. Sutanto has severely damaged his reputation as a tough law enforcer through his bizarre decision to provide a police general convicted of corruption with the luxury of serving his 18-month-jail term in a police detention center in Depok, West Java, instead of the Cipinang Penitentiary.

Sutanto's argument for giving this privilege looked scandalous because he insisted that other convicts in Cipinang prison might be violent against the senior police officer, former detective chief Comr. Gen. Suyitno Landung. Later Sutanto said the prison was overcrowded.

No one could believe this explanation, perhaps not even Sutanto himself.

Sending a person who has been found guilty by a public court to a police detention center just because the convict is a senior police officer is ridiculous. People who still have faith that the police force can restore its notorious image to that of reliable law enforcer and public protector may feel betrayed. That hope, no matter how small it is, has been damaged by Sutanto, who many people had expected would improve the police's reputation.

Sutanto has been unable to put aside his sense of solidarity with a former colleague, who was brought to court with Sutanto's full endorsement. He won public applause last year when he brought to justice Suyitno and Brig. Gen. Samuel Ismoko for accepting bribes. Now Sutanto can't blame anyone when people boo him over his fatal decision.

Ismoko was released earlier this month, after the Jakarta High Court reduced his jail sentence from 18 to 13 months in January.

On Oct. 10, last year, the South Jakarta Court sentenced Suyitno to 18 months in jail for accepting a car worth Rp 247 million (US$26,500) from a criminal suspect while heading an investigation into a Rp 1.7 trillion lending scam involving state bank BNI in 2003.

Before and during the trial session Suyitno was also detained at a police detention center at the National Police Headquarters. It was unbelievable that Sutanto had the guts to jail a very senior colleague, and many people hoped it could be a strong message to the police corps that no police officer, including generals, could escape justice if they committed crimes.

Immediately after President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono installed Gen. Sutanto as the new National Police chief in July 2005, replacing Gen. Da'i Bachtiar, Sutanto outlined his priorities, which included the eradication of corruption, gambling and drug abuse. It took him only a few months to force his critics to swallow their claims that he would not be different to his predecessors.

The critics said at the time that he would be unable to deliver his promises because the three kinds of vice were so widespread and systematic that many described them as part of Indonesian culture. The police is publicly perceived as one of most corrupt state institutions in this country and regarded as a house nearly impossible to clean without demolishing the whole building.

However, he proved wrong those who were skeptical of his capability and integrity.

The result of his war against gambling was encouraging. The widespread togel (illegal lotteries), which millions of poor people were addicted to, quickly disappeared. Even now the heat is still there, although the practice has slowly resumed. The war against drugs was also quite hopeful, because a number of major traffickers and producers were taken to court and many criminals received heavy punishments.

How about the war on corruption? The case of Suyitno is clearly very damaging to Sutanto's reputation. He got off to a very good start and for about 18 months many people were still impressed by his achievements.

Sutanto can continue to defend his decision not to send Suyitno to a public prison, but the more he speaks about it, the less trust he gets from the public.

Surely Sutanto still has a chance for damage control. He has no choice but to say to Suyitno: ""You must serve your jail term in Cipinang."" But does he have the guts to do it?

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