Jokowi accused of reneging on graft vow
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DESPITE A PLEDGE during the presidential election campaign last year to fight against corruption, president Joko "Jokowi" Widodo failed to keep the promise after taking power, according to a vice chairman and commissioner of the Corruption Eradication Com
Adnan Pandu Praja, KPK’s vice chairman and commissioner, said his agency was under the worst condition due to the lack of support by the Jokowi-led government.
“Jokowi is only a member of his political party. He was not supported by Megawati, who is his boss. And that makes it impossible for Jokowi to do any real work,” KPK vice chairman said.
During his election campaign, Jokowi pledged to cut down corruption in Indonesia, Asean’s biggest economy, by at least 70 per cent.
“They are politicians. When they campaigned, they pledged everything. But when they were chosen, they [also] forgot everything.”
“That is why there is a good saying by a prominent peace activist that my loyalty with my political party will end, when my loyalty to my country begins,” he said.
He was speaking at a meeting with a group of Thai journalists who visited his agency in Jakarta as part of a training course organised by the Asean Journalists Club of Thailand.
The anti-corruption commissioner said the parliament was also considering a bill that he believed would weaken the power of KPK as the majority of the cases investigated by his agency were against parliament members. “That is why the parliament does not support KPK,” he said.
Since its establishment in 2003, KPK has a successful track record with a 100 per cent conviction rate, putting 453 individuals including politicians, former ministers and other |high-ranking officials, behind bars.
However, after the successful corruption eradication body named a graft suspect as the candidate for the police chief post, it is now in a big trouble.
“The head of KPK was arrested by the police, who accused him of corruption, as a retaliatory action against the KPK, who had already made accusations against the new chief of police candidate, who was nominated by Jokowi. The war between KPK and the Indonesian police thus began,” the KPK vice chairman said.
Meanwhile, the civil society also took KPK by surprise as NGOs and civil society members, who previously supported the body, seemed to fade away as they were afraid of threats and being accused of being suspects of corruption, said the KPK vice chairman.
The commissioner also believed that Indonesia could not reduce corruption effectively as the country was too large, with a population of 240 million spread all over its archipelago.
