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View point: Oh man, our representatives defend the corrupt system?
Despite strong popular objection, the lawmakersâ insistence on revising Law No
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Despite strong popular objection, the lawmakers' insistence on revising Law No. 30/2002 on the Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK) has again raised the clichéd question: Do they defend the people they are supposed to represent or the corrupt system the country is trying to reform?
Given broader perspective, the House legislators siding with the political and business elite have again provoked people to ask, 'Whom do the House politicians represent, really?'
It looks like House legislators tend to go against popular will. When people want strong political support to stem corruption, the lawmakers insist on amending the law in such a way that it will practically strip the KPK of its key powers, such as wiretapping and investigation.
Last month, Deputy House speaker Fahri Hamzah angered the public when he attempted, unsuccessfully, to fend off KPK investigators who sought to search the office of his fellow Prosperous Justice Party (PKS) lawmaker, who had been implicated in a bribery case, simply because the sleuths were accompanied by armed police.
In December, when tax payers demanded a transparent ethics probe into the then House speaker Setya Novanto's alleged illicit attempts to get Freeport Indonesia shares granted in the name of President Joko 'Jokowi' Widodo and Vice President Jusuf Kalla, numerous lawmakers blindly defended him.
In the area of legislation, one of the House's main jobs, our legislators are hopeless. Last year, they managed to endorse only 12 out of the 39 bills they were supposed to pass into law. Note that almost all of the endorsed bills were amendments, treaties and government regulations in lieu of a law.
And the list can endlessly go on.
Instead of defending public interest, very often politicians from various factions turn the House of Representatives into a battle front for strategic positions. We still vividly remember when the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P), as the winner of the 2014 election, lost the top House leadership to a coalition of losers. Then Golkar Party politicians took their bitter internal confrontations to the House.
No wonder public trust in the legislature has been declining. The latest survey by pollster Lembaga Indikator Politik found that the ongoing revision of the KPK law has further eroded the People's confidence in their 'representatives' in the House.
The survey found that public confidence in the House was 59.2 percent in January 2015 but that it plummeted to 48.5 percent in January this year ' with lawmakers' insistence on amending the KPK law invoking the most negative sentiment.
But as always, most lawmakers, spearheaded by those from the ruling PDI-P, are turning a deaf ear to the public call to halt it. Ironically, in the past, the PDI-P was the one party, which vehemently rejected attempts to weaken the KPK during the Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono administration.
House members are probably best described as 'party workers' ' a famous catchphrase coined by PDI-P matriarch Megawati Soekarnoputri to make it clear to her rank and file, including President Jokowi, that everything they do they do it only for PDI-P.
House members are the mouthpiece of their respective political parties rather than members elected to defend their voters. This is of course dangerous because most parties in the country have been founded and are virtually 'owned' by plutocrats ' the elites who command power from their wealth.
It is well understood that the plutocrats use their immense resources to amass more power to boost their political clout.
Ideally, in the simplest of terms, voters go to the polls to elect figures that will represent them in the House ' people who will voice their constituents' complaints, their wishes and their aspirations to make the nation better. But what really happens at the polling stations is that voters transfer their power to the politicians who promise to represent their interest in the House.
Unfortunately, there has been no legal means for the voters to withdraw the power if the politicians they placed on the comfortable seat at the House fail to make good on their promises. All the liars then fully belong to their respective political parties. Then, as Megawati rightly suggests, their political loyalty goes to the party.
Once they get seats in the House, with up to Rp 60 million in monthly take-home pay, legislators usually begin to forget the people who have elected them. Then they start to voice political interest that has little or nothing to do with what their voters really want.
Gone are all those legislative candidates' lofty promises to make education free, rebuild dirt roads in the village, provide cheap medication, a playground in the neighborhood, a new place of worship, corruption-free public service, etc. And the chosen politicians will be, mostly, nowhere to be seen until the next election campaign comes five years later, when candidates may have to spend a lot of money for votes.
Under the present system, House members are under the direct supervision of their respective political parties. While the people remain powerless, it is the party that wields the authority to fire those legislators it deems as non-performing or whom have been, perhaps, convicted of a crime.
Since our legislators answer to their political parties instead of the people, is it any wonder they feel free to become party slaves rather than work as a servant of the people. No wonder they are unproductive, corrupt and uncaring.
Dear legislators, can you make laws that will allow voters to withdraw their support and unseat representatives who do not fight for the good of the public? And please insert the bill on this year's priority list.
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The author is a staff writer at The Jakarta Post.
