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total of 260 high ranking generals in police institutions currently have no duties but still enjoy institutional facilities and privileges, data from the Indonesian Police Watch (IPW) has revealed.

The IPW said Indonesia had one four-star general, eight three-star generals while 257 others were two and one-star generals.

“The number of generals has been increasing dramatically since the reform era [starting in 1998]. During the New Order, we only had a maximum of 67 generals. Today, we have more than 200,” IPW coordinator Neta Pane told The Jakarta Post in a recent interview.

Based on the Personnel Standard List (DSP), the National Police should only have 240 generals.

Therefore, police institutions should rearrange their mechanism when promoting police officers into generals.

According to Neta, many of those generals did not have specific duties in their offices.

“Our data says a total of 20 police generals are jobless or have no positions at all. They just enjoy the facilities and their salaries,” he said.

Citing an example, Neta named Comr. Gen. Susno Duadji, the former National Police chief detective. Susno was sentenced by the South Jakarta District Court last March to 3.5 years in prison and was ordered to pay Rp 200 million (US$22,200) in fines or serve an additional four months in prison.

He was found guilty of accepting Rp 500 million in bribes from fisheries firm PT Salma Arowana Lestari, and of embezzling security funds that were earmarked for the 2008 West Java gubernatorial election. He was also ordered to return the Rp 4 billion he had been accused of stealing.

Today, Susno serves as an advisor for the National Police chief Gen. Timor Pradopo’s expert staff.

“This is weird. Susno is a three-star general and he is an advisor for a two-star general. The advisor position did not exist before. The police just created this new position for Susno,” Neta said.

According to Neta, too many generals in police institutions have become a barrier for the police to move forward. The salaries of these generals, their operational costs and other facilities, have also caused police budgets to be higher.

The IPW also noted that the budget for the police increased by 1,000 percent after the reform era. Reports said the police received nearly Rp 30 trillion of budget per year.

“A total of 65 percent of the budget is only used to pay salaries for police,” Neta said.

He pointed to regional expansion across the country as one cause of the enormous number of generals.

There is no confirmation from the police on the IPW statement.

Nasir Djamil, deputy chairman of the House of Representatives Commission III on legal affairs and laws, human rights and security, said the police should re-arrange the mechanism to approve generals to star rank.

“It is too much. We will ask the police to be more selective in giving officials new stars. Perhaps a three-star general will be able to become the National Police chief in the future,” he said.

According to Nasir, echelon status and experience were more important than rankings in deciding if officers were appropriate for leadership roles or not.

“It is widely known that if you have relatives in the police, promotion is easier. But officers who perform well without any relations in the institutions will not be promoted easily,” he said.