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Ending corruption hinges on political will, 2024 candidates say
The three candidates vying for the presidency at next month's polls have all vowed to eliminate graft, including by restoring the KPK's strength, but primarily by taking the helm on the country's war on corruption.
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Presidential and vice presidential candidates (from left) Anies Baswedan, Muhaimin Iskandar, Prabowo Subianto, Gibran Rakabuming Raka, Ganjar Pranowo and Mahfud MD get ready for a group photo on Jan. 17, 2024, after delivering their antigraft strategies at the Strengthening Anticorruption for State Apparatus (Paku Integritas) event held by the Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK) in Jakarta. (Reuters/Willy Kurniawan)
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ll three candidate pairs have pledged to strengthen the Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK) if they win the 2024 presidential election, following scandals, misconduct and withering public trust that has battered the agency in recent years.
Speaking on Wednesday at the Strengthening Anticorruption for State Apparatus, or Paku Integritas (nail of integrity), held by the KPK in Jakarta, the candidate pairs presented strategies for eradicating corruption that ranged from revising the latest KPK Law to improving the welfare of civil servants.
Their commitment pledge comes amid a period widely considered as the worst era in the country’s war on corruption since the New Order regime fell in 1998, after Indonesia’s ranking on the Corruption Perceptions Index fell to 110th out of 180 countries in 2022, the “the most drastic decline since 1995”, according to Transparency International Indonesia.
The existing KPK Law, an amended version that lawmakers and the government of President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo passed in 2019, has been widely blamed for systematically defanging the antigraft body.
Anies Baswedan, who is running with Muhaimin Iskandar, said “restoring the authority of the KPK” was essential to rebuilding public confidence in the agency, and that this was only possible by revising the 2019 KPK Law, including overhauling the KPK’s recruitment system.
“The commitment to eradicating corruption must come from the top,” Anies said.
Numerous surveys by leading think tanks, including Indikator Politik Indonesia, found that public trust in the commission had plunged since 2020, after the new law limited the KPK’s authority by changing its recruitment system and requiring all its employees achieve civil servant status, among other alterations.
