P

olice observers have called on the Jakarta Police to more closely monitor officers in the wake of a report pointing to a steep rise in the number of city police officers implicated in criminal cases.

At the end of last year, the force released its annual report, which revealed the involvement of 112 police officers in various criminal cases. The statistic represented a serious jump from the previous year, when the annual report listed just 26 officers as having been implicated in crimes.

According to University of Indonesia police observer Bambang Widodo Umar, the report indicates that the Jakarta Police are failing to properly monitor their field officers.

'€œIt shows that the Jakarta Police, through their internal affairs division, do not have in place a rigorous system to monitor officers, so that in the field, officers do whatever they want '€” leading, in some cases, to abuses of power,'€ Bambang said.

Bambang recommended that the internal affairs division not only step up its monitoring of officers, but also reveal to the public the processes used to enforce the law against police officers.

According to Bambang, the public are skeptical about the sincerity of prosecutions of police officers, especially the chances of a final punishment.

Meanwhile, he added, the public, if made aware of monitoring and sanctioning processes, would be able to play a part in them, in turn encouraging officers not to engage in criminal activity or abuse of power.

He emphasized that the force would in doing so not tarnish its reputation, but would instead gain greater public trust.

Bambang added that the police should also overhaul its recruitment system and tighten screenings to weed out those officers likely to abuse their power.

Concurring with Bambang was the National Police Commission'€™s Edi Saputra Hasibuan, who separately said that the city police, through the internal affairs division, should improve the monitoring system.

'€œOfficers found to have committed crimes should not be protected,'€ Edi said.

The force, he added, should also hold seminars and training programs for its officers to discourage them from engaging in crime.

He suggested that the institution also establish a rewards system to promote professionalism among police personnel.

At the same time, Edi applauded the Jakarta Police'€™s progress under recently appointed chief Insp. Gen. Tito Karnavian.

Unlike Bambang, Edi said that the sharp rise in the number of officers implicated in crimes was indicative not of a rise in criminality, but of a greater will to apply the law to officers, rather than covering up police involvement in crime.

Last year, a number of cases involving city police officers made headlines.

In January last year, the Jakarta Police'€™s narcotics directorate arrested five officers '€” including one member of the narcotics directorate '€” in a series of raids targeting drug possession.

From the suspects, officers confiscated 717 grams of methamphetamine, 7,457 ecstasy pills, electronic scales, a glass pipe and a bong.

In November, meanwhile, a policeman identified as Brig. Dedi Aleksander Sinaga, along with three companions, was detained by the Taman Sari Police on suspicion of defrauding and sexually assaulting a woman at a hotel in West Jakarta.