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ndonesia Corruption Watch (ICW) spoke on Sunday against a revision of Government Regulation No. 99/2012 on requirements for remission, which has been touted as a solution to prison overcrowding.

Law and Human Rights Minister Yasonna Laoly has said that the government is preparing a revision of the regulation, which also regulates sentence cut requirements for extraordinary crimes such as corruption and terrorism, following clashes in overcrowded penitentiaries.

Riots have erupted over the past few months in poorly guarded narcotics-infested penitentiaries ruled by drugs kingpins.

ICW activist Emerson Yuntho said that the 2012 regulation tightened the granting of remission and parole to corruption convicts.

“I question Yasonna’s plan to revise the government regulation. I see that political interest stands out as the reason for the revision because a lot of corruption convicts are politicians,” Emerson said at the ICW’s office.

He added that with the revision, corruption inmates would gain advantages as he believed that the ministry intended to replace the prevailing regulation with the previous one.

Article 34 of Government Regulation No. 26/2006, the previous regulation, states that inmates of terrorism, drugs, corruption, crimes against state security and severe human rights violations and other organized transnational crimes would only be granted remission if they were well-behaved and had served one-third of their prison sentence.

However, Article 34 in the prevailing regulation includes several requirements for inmates to receive remission, such as agreeing to be a justice collaborator and having fully paid either fines or substitute funds as determined by a court verdict.

“I’m concerned about the fact that the revision of the regulation will ease requirements for corruption convicts to receive remission. And that will not create a deterrent effect,” Emerson said.

The ministry has acknowledged that the major problem of overcrowded prisons were narcotics inmates, which account for one-third of inmates.

Most of the inmates are addicts, not traffickers or kingpins.

In 2014, ICW monitored 395 corruption cases with 479 defendants, 372 of whom were sentenced to under four years in prison. The average punishment for corruption convicts was two years.

“With such light sentences, added with remission or parole, I can assure you that there will not be a deterrent effect. That is a bad message for the public,” Emerson said.

Trisakti University law expert and former judge Asep Iwan Iriawan said that all inmates had remission rights, but that the revision of the government regulation was not needed.

“Revising the regulation on account of prison overcapacity does not make any sense. Have you ever been to Sukamiskin Penitentiary? Because corruption inmates there get their own cell,” Asep said.

He added that prison overcapacity was not related to the revision of the 2012 government regulation.

“Overcapacity is being used to push the ministry to revise the regulation,” Emerson said.

He added that most of the overcrowded prisons housed drug inmates, however if the government only focused on giving remission to them, some people would voice concerns of being treated unfairly.

“If the revision only specifies remission for drug inmates, that is discriminatory toward other inmates,” Emerson said. (wnd)