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Rock band urges House to create pro-death-penalty-law for corruptors
For the sake of justice: Slank members, (left to right) Kaka, Ivanka, Bimbim, Ridho and Abdee, during an album launch on June 22, 2011
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span class="inline inline-center">For the sake of justice: Slank members, (left to right) Kaka, Ivanka, Bimbim, Ridho and Abdee, during an album launch on June 22, 2011. During a musical performance staged at the Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK) headquarters on Monday, the legendary rock band Slank called on the House of Representatives to create a law that imposes the death penalty on corrupt officials. (JP/Wibisono Notodirdjo)
Legendary Indonesian rock band Slank has called on the House of Representatives to create a law that imposes the death penalty on people who have committed corruption.
During their short musical performance at the Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK) headquarters, on Monday, lead vocalist Akhadi Wira Satriaji, who is popularly known as Kaka, and drummer Bimbim voiced their support for the antigraft body to the audience.
"Instead of proposing amendments to the 2002 KPK Law, it's better for House members to produce a law that stipulates a death penalty for corrupt officials," said Bimbim. He made the statement before the veteran rock band performed one of its popular songs, entitled "Koruptor Dor".
Earlier, Kaka said Slank's performance at the KPK headquarters was done in support of the antigraft body. 'We are performing today to assert that Slank is anticorruption and supports the KPK,' said the band's vocalist before he sang a song entitled 'Seperti Para Koruptor', the first of five songs the band played. The three others songs were 'Halal', 'Hey Bung', a song that captures Indonesia's situation during the authoritarian New Order era, and 'Ku Tak Bisa'.
Before the band's musical performance, a representative of the KPK employees association (WP KPK), who identified himself only as Faisal, conveyed all KPK employees' rejection of the planned amendments of the KPK law.
The WP KPK urged President Joko 'Jokowi' Widodo to withdraw the draft KPK Law revisions already submitted by the government to the House, Faisal read from an association statement. It also urged the House to stop the discussion on the revisions. In the statement, the WP KPK voiced its support for the KPK leaders who had strongly rejected the plan.
The House started discussions over the revisions earlier this month despite a public outcry. Many parties have feared that such a move will weaken the KPK, an antigraft institution that has largely won the public trust. The revisions of the KPK Law are listed as one of the priority bills in the 2016 National Legislation Program (Prolegnas).
The House has 40 priority bills on the Prolegnas 2016, which must be finished this year. Several lawmakers, many of them from the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P), Jokowi's supporting party, which is also the main driver of the revisions, have denied suspicions that they intend to weaken the KPK. The proposed KPK Law revisions consists of four amendment points that have been strongly criticized by the public.
The four amendments would mandate the establishment of an oversight council to monitor the antigraft body's performance, give the KPK the authority to issue investigation termination warrants in corruption cases, require the KPK to obtain permits to conduct wiretaps and remove the KPK's ability to recruit its own investigators. (ebf)
