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o the ruling party has accused a number of media outlets of distorting Megawati Soekarnoputri'€™s statements.

The chairwoman of the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P), it said, never suggested the disbandment of the Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK) in her recent speech, as some media claimed. What she said, it explained, was that we needed to end corruption once and for all so the agency would no longer be necessary and could be disbanded.

OK. If that is what she actually said, there'€™s no need for the media to twist her remarks just to make a cheap headline story on a slow news day. That'€™s still an utterly bizarre statement coming from a former head of state. It'€™s still newsworthy and the public should take it seriously, as it is not a slip of the tongue. That is the ruling party'€™s view of the KPK and it is wrong.

Saying we no longer need the KPK when we have got rid of corruption once and for all is at best tautological and naive, if plainly pointless. It'€™s so simple a form of logic that any third grader, who has no grasp of how tremendously complex and evil the real world is, would proudly agree. Yes, of course, when corruption is no more, an anti-graft body is no longer relevant. But what does that even mean? Is there a city so clean that a sanitation agency is no longer needed?

But the problem with her speech is bigger than just poor logic. It is also technically wrong. In the first place, the KPK was never created to eliminate corruption until the last trace. It was established as an ad hoc institution because the existing law enforcement bodies tasked with fighting graft '€” the National Police and the Attorney General'€™s Office (AGO) '€” are heavily infested with graft. You can never clean a dirty house with a dirty broom.

That adage is the raison d'۪̻tre for the KPK.

The 2002 law on the KPK clearly states that the two primary reasons for the establishment of the agency are that '€œcorruption eradication [efforts] should be intensified'€ and '€œthat the existing agencies handling corruption cases [i.e. the police force and the AGO] have not been effective and efficient.'€

The law goes as far as granting the KPK the authority to take over the investigation and prosecution of graft cases handled by the police and the AGO, as stipulated under Article 8. Article 9 then clarifies that the anti-graft body could only do that when '€œpublic reports on corruption are not followed up'€ and '€œthe investigation into a corruption case is languishing for unaccountable reasons'€, '€œconducted to protect the real perpetrator'€, '€œriddled with graft'€ and '€œhindered by the interference from the executive, judicative and legislative powers'€.

This article basically outlines how the police and the AGO have done their jobs all this time and perfectly explains why a more independent and stronger agency like the KPK is needed, even though their authorities overlap, which many critics say has created serious legal uncertainty.

If Megawati knew what she was saying, she would'€™ve said: We need to launch a sweeping reform of the police and the AGO so that they are professional and credible enough to combat corruption and we could disband the KPK. This is indeed still hard to achieve and would still provoke social media users and create a backlash, but it makes more much sense than simply saying the KPK could be disbanded if corruption, God knows when, ceases to exist.

This is intriguing. Does Megawati know better? Well, she should.

The KPK Law was enacted under her administration. She was the person assigned by the lawmakers to set up the antigraft body in 2002. The notion that the KPK was created as an independent, ad hoc body because the police and the AGO were '€œineffective'€ is written on the first page of the law. It'€™s the second clause under the part menimbang (considering). Her failing to acknowledge this fact is baffling and outrageous. She should have known better.

And if she did know, why did she ignore it?

We may never know why. But the fact is the ruling party has done nothing to reform the notoriously corrupt law enforcement agencies, especially the police. In fact, the public perception in the first year of President Joko '€œJokowi'€ Widodo'€™s administration is that it has been backing the old guard within the police force who have persistently and wantonly resisted reform.

The image of the police is already in tatters after being hit by scandal after scandal in recent years. At this point, we expect Jokowi '€” the '€œparty officer'€ assigned by the PDI-P to lead the nation '€” to bring changes to the power structure within the police. He instead tapped a graft suspect, who happens to be a close aide to his political patron, to be its chief. The President finally did an about face due to public uproar, but only after two of the KPK leaders were arrested and slapped with dubious charges by the police and forced to resign.

That said, her bizarre remarks could easily be interpreted by cynics as a deliberate attempt to water down the need to reform the police, and create a false sense that the KPK'€™s existence, which is a nightmare for crooked politicians, is an indicator that the country'€™s antigraft fight is going nowhere. It is not too far-fetched even to assume that her statements about the KPK were nothing but red herrings. For she is basically saying the KPK exists simply because we are perennially corrupt, not because the existing official agencies that are supposed to tackle corruption are incapable of purging endemic corruption within themselves and thus have become part of the problem.

No, Bu Mega, we have the KPK mainly because we distrust the police. And, in case you don'€™t know, that distrust deepened under your rule.