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Court invites public to watch law enforcers through digital platform
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Supreme Court chief justice Hatta Ali speaks in a press conference at the court’s office in Jakarta. (Tempo/-)
T
he Supreme Court has collaborated with the European Union and the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) to involve the general public in watching the country's judiciary through a new whistleblowing platform.
A new application, called Information System Monitoring (SIWAS), was introduced on Thursday and enables people to report any abuse of power, improper manners, or ethical violations they witness being committed by the judicial apparatus in the national and local courts to the Supreme Court, the court's chief justice, Hatta Ali, said on Thursday
People would be able to make reports through the SIWAS website, text messages, e-mails, telephone calls and letters, as explained on the website page, he added.
"In the previous mechanism, only parties internal to the judicial branch [could report such issues], but now we accommodate citizens to also report to us," Hatta said.
The SIWAS platform also guaranteed a high degree of confidentiality to whistleblowers who submit reports since they would remain anonymous, Hatta said, adding that any report of an alleged violation would be taken seriously and dealt with in a transparent manner.
“If the reports were proven true, the Supreme Court would impose ethical sanctions on the parties,” Hatta said.
UNDP director for Indonesia Christophe Bahuet said SIWAS was an important breakthrough for the Supreme Court to improve its transparency, accountability and efforts in eradicating corruption, which in turn would restore the public trust that in the recent years has kept decreasing because of a judiciary that was continually implicated in corruption cases. (bbn)
