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Jokowi will not let KPK be weakened: Chief of staff
Keeping promises: Presidential Chief of Staff Teten Masduki talks to journalists at the Presidential Palace
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Keeping promises: Presidential Chief of Staff Teten Masduki talks to journalists at the Presidential Palace. He said that President Joko âJokowiâ Widodo would stop the deliberation of the 2002 Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK) Law draft revision if it seemed on track to weaken anti-graft measures. (Kompas) (KPK) Law draft revision if it seemed on track to weaken anti-graft measures. (Kompas)
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span class="inline inline-center">Keeping promises: Presidential Chief of Staff Teten Masduki talks to journalists at the Presidential Palace. He said that President Joko 'Jokowi' Widodo would stop the deliberation of the 2002 Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK) Law draft revision if it seemed on track to weaken anti-graft measures. (Kompas)
Presidential Chief of Staff Teten Masduki has asserted that President Joko 'Jokowi' Widodo would not stand by and allow any attempt to weaken the Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK) during the deliberation of the draft revision of law no. 30/2002 on the anti-graft body.
The KPK Law draft revision has been included in the 2015 National Legislation Program (Prolegnas).
'It is probable that the President would either end the discussion or issue a Presidential Mandate [Ampres] on the KPK Law revision if he felt that it was going to weaken the anti-graft body,' said Teten as quoted by tempo.co at in Jakarta on Sunday.
Teten said that since the very beginning, Jokowi had been clear that the KPK Law revision was aimed at strengthening the anti-graft body, not weakening it.
'This is what our fellows at the House of Representatives, which has the legal right to revise the law, must pay close attention to,' said Teten.
Polemics around the KPK Law revision came to the spotlight at the beginning of October after several House members proposed the revision of several articles, drawing sharp criticisms that their changes would potentially weaken the body's graft-fighting power. Only one month later, the same article revisions were raised again, which was suspected to be part of a government deal proposed by Law and Human Rights Minister Yasonna Laoly to push forward another deliberation ' of the tax amnesty draft bill.
In the articles proposed by the House, the KPK would function more as a corruption prevention body instead of a corruption law enforcement body. Also, under the current draft, the body's life span will be limited to only another 12 years, and it would only be able to handle corruption cases involving potential state losses of more than Rp 50 billion (US$3.6 million). The KPK's power to bring charges against corruption suspects are set to be removed and it's investigations may be required to be based only on recommendations from the police and prosecutor's offices ' so any wiretapping by the KPK would first need approval from heads of district courts. It may, however, be given the authority to issue a Letter of Order to Stop Investigation (SP3), a power not provided in the prevailing 2002 KPK Law.
Earlier, Coordinating Political, Legal and Security Affairs Minister Luhut Binsar Panjaitan said the government would safeguard the revision process of the 2002 KPK Law and ensure that the revision would focus only on perceived initial oversights, the ceasing of investigations into deceased corruption suspects and on independent investigators. (ebf)
