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Most tax officials should be outraged by Rafael Trisambodo
Rafael was perhaps unlucky, too greedy and showing off his notorious wealth too much.
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Tax officer Rafael Alun Trisambodo arrives at the Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK) building in South Jakarta on March 1 to comply with the KPK's summons to clarify his wealth. (Kompas.com/Syakirun Ni'am)
T
he vast majority of the estimated 45,000 tax officials were certainly outraged by the nationwide revelations in social and mainstream media of the questionable wealth and luxury lifestyle of tax officer Rafael Alun Trisambodo and his family.
Given the remarkable improvement taxpayers have seen and experienced in the tax administration services over the past few years, the disclosure of Rafael’s unusually huge assets and blatant wealth flexing was indeed a painful surprise.
But the lingering question is whether the Rafael case is an exception or only the tip of the iceberg. Since the Taxation Directorate General’s (DGT) internal control department and the tax intelligence division did not contribute anything to the uncovering of Rafael’s case, most analysts opt for the second answer.
We suspect that Rafael was just unlucky, too greedy and showing off his notorious wealth too much. He would never have been subjected to such investigative audits by the DGT and the Corruption Eradication Cormmission (KPK) had his son not been involved in and charged with the aggravated assault of the son of a local leader of GP Ansor, the youth wing of the country’s largest Muslim organization Nahdlatul Ulama, late last month.
The assault went so viral on social media and generated so much headline news in electronic and print media that Finance Minister Sri Mulyani Indrawati was prompted to respond with tough measures, including dismissing Rafael as head of general affairs at the South Jakarta tax office.
Yet in another discouraging revelation of how seemingly pathetic the agencies in charge of fighting and preventing corruption are, it turned out that the KPK had been alerted to Rafael’s questionable wealth several years before the hubbub occurred.
The Financial Transaction Report and Analysis Center (PPATK), the country’s financial intelligence agency, had also notified the KPK in 2012 about Rafael’s suspicious financial transactions involving nominee accounts and huge sums way beyond his financial profile. But the law enforcers did not follow up on the suspicions. Or perhaps they could not find evidence to ensnare the taxman?
