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Jakarta Post

KPK'€™s new life

JP/AwoThe month-long standoff between the National Police and the Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK) has appeared to subside, but the antigraft body has paid a heavy price

The Jakarta Post
Sun, March 1, 2015

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KPK'€™s new life

JP/Awo

The month-long standoff between the National Police and the Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK) has appeared to subside, but the antigraft body has paid a heavy price. President Joko '€œJokowi'€ Widodo has put a new face on the KPK by appointing three acting leaders in place of suspended chief Abraham Samad and deputy chief Bambang Widjojanto, who are facing criminal charges.

Apart from an apparent truce between the two law enforcement agencies, the impact of the replacement has drastically altered the KPK'€™s approach in eradicating corruption. In his first days at the helm of the KPK, acting chief Taufiequrachman Ruki took measures unlikely to have been taken by Abraham and Bambang.

Ruki said the KPK would consider transferring certain cases under investigation to the police and the Attorney General'€™s Office (AGO), citing its shortage of investigators. The plan contradicts the KPK'€™s raison d'€™etre, which was to plug holes in corruption investigations conducted by either the police or the AGO. Quite often, the police and the AGO dropped investigations into graft cases under the pretext of a lack of evidence.

The KPK Law stipulates that the commission cannot stop investigations it has started. The law also allows the KPK to take over cases from the police and the AGO if the two fail to complete an investigation.

Therefore, a transfer of investigations from the KPK would violate Article 50 of the 2002 Corruption Law, which prohibits the police and AGO from taking over cases being investigated by the KPK.

Ruki, the first KPK chief, who served from 2004 to 2008, also unveiled a plan to hire 50 police detectives to help the commission intensify efforts to fight corruption. The KPK is allowed to recruit independent investigators, which corruption watchdogs say would end its dependence on police investigators.

The understaffed KPK has often seen the National Police withdraw its investigators on loan to the commission each time the two institutions lock horns. In the latest feud, the police plan to criminalize 21 former police detectives-cum-KPK investigators for illegal possession of firearms.

The KPK leaders say this would have not happened had the police not postponed extending the investigators'€™ permits to possess arms.

The National Police detective directorate is also reopening an old assault case involving senior KPK investigator Novel Baswedan when he was a Bengkulu police officer in 2004. Clearly, the KPK remains vulnerable to criminalization despite President Jokowi'€™s order for the police to discontinue such behavior.

On Friday, Jokowi received all five KPK leaders at the palace, but there was no signal that the President would take action against the police for allegedly weakening the KPK by pressing criminal charges against KPK staff. KPK acting chief Ruki said the President would not intervene with the police investigation launched against KPK investigators or the KPK'€™s probe into graft cases involving police officers.

***

Another protracted standoff is pitting Jakarta Governor Basuki '€Ahok'€ Tjahaja Purnama against the capital'€™s legislators. On Thursday, the Jakarta City Council unanimously approved a move to conduct an inquiry into alleged violations of the laws and regulations by the governor. The councilors have accused Ahok of submitting an '€œillegal'€ city budget to the Home Ministry. They said Ahok had unilaterally altered the budget that had already been endorsed by the council.

In theory, the move opens the door to impeachment, but only if the inquiry finds Ahok guilty as charged. In that case, Deputy Jakarta Governor Djarot Saiful Hidayat, a politician of the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P), would succeed Ahok.

The inquiry caps a long-standing conflict between Ahok and Jakarta politicians. Initially, only the opposition bloc fought Ahok, but now the ruling and opposition camps have joined forces in trying to tame the combative governor. After quitting the Gerindra Party last year, Ahok has no political party support on his side.

Ahok has shown no fear, however. After meeting with President Jokowi on Friday, Ahok said the inquiry would give him an opportunity to explain his implementation of e-budgeting as part of the effort to promote transparency in government.

Amid all this political noise, the public took revenge on gangs of motorcycle thieves who have sparked anxiety across Greater Jakarta. Locals in Pondok Aren in Tangerang, west of Jakarta, lynched a suspected motorcycle thief on Tuesday after his and his friends'€™ robbery attempt failed. Angry residents beat and eventually burned the young man alive.

As per usual, no arrest has been made of those responsible for the killing. Instead, the police conducted a raid in a village in Lampung, which law enforcers said was home to motorcycle thieves operating in Greater Jakarta.

A number of suspected thieves who have been arrested say poverty was the reason for their crimes. It is likely that more people are feeling the pinch due to the soaring commodity prices that have not decreased despite the government twice lowering fuel prices since January. Among the basic needs is rice, the price of which until this week had risen by 30 percent due to a supply shortage.

'€” Dwi Atmanta

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