I’m in charge here
Relations
between Indonesian President Joko Widodo and Megawati Sukarnoputri, the woman
who was instrumental in putting him in power, are continuing to deteriorate,
with Megawati’s Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle [PDI-P] pushing a bill
to diminish the clout of the powerful Corruption Eradication Commission and
Jokowi saying he has no plans to revise the law governing the commission.
Jokowi,
the extremely popular former governor of Jakarta, hitched his wagon to the
PDI-P’s star in the 2014 presidential election and depended on its electoral
and organizational skills to prevail over Prabowo Subianto, his opponent.
Today, however, he has few allies in the country’s national institutions and
his voter support appears only every five years.
The rift has been growing for months after Jokowi refused to appoint
Budi Gunawan, a close personal friend of Megawati, the National Police Chief in
March. The KPK, as the corruption watchdog organization is known, charged him
with bribery and money laundering in connection with an unexplained Rp95
billion (US$7.13 million) in his personal bank accounts. The KPK alleged he had
acquired the funds through bribes and gratuities, including bribes supposedly
paid by officers in pursuit of higher police posts. Several weeks of wrangling
ensued, with Jokowi eventually appointing Badrodin Haiti as national police
chief. Badrodin subsequently chose Budi, known as “Budi the bagman,” to the No.
2 post.
In April, at the PDI-P’s party enclave in Bali, Megawati delivered a
speech from the podium with Jokowi sitting in the audience that in effect told
the President that he was a product of the party and that his job was to remain
in its service. Indonesia’s system of democracy, she said “regulates that the
president and vice president naturally enforce a political party’s policy
line,” she said. “That’s the constitutional mechanism that we know.”
She told a roomful of party cadres she had faced “many betrayals” and
adding that “multiple times I was stabbed in the back” because of “political
ambitions for power.” Jokowi was not invited to speak at the congress.
She is also said to be angry because the PDI-P was given only four positions in
the 34-member cabinet last October – no more than any of the other parties in
Jokowi’s coalition.
In early June, Megawati’s rock musician son, Prananda Prabowo, released
a song titled “Traitor,” that party insiders say was aimed at two top ministers
said to have the presidential ear and provide a bulwark against PDI-P
influence.
It is the
KPK that has particularly angered Megawati. She has powerful allies in
the police, the courts and the military who agree that the agency must be
reined in. One western observer said the KPK is “toast.” According to
figures compiled by the Jakarta Globe, the KPK has prosecuted and jailed more
members of the PDI-P than any other Indonesian political party. Ironically
the organization was set up in 2002 when Megawati was Indonesia’s president.
In the 13 years since, it has become the most formidable anti-graft organization
in the country by far, boasting a 100 percent conviction rate. Since it became
operational in 2003, it has investigated, prosecuted and achieved 86 cases of
bribery and graft related to government procurements and budgets, including
members of former President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono’s own cabinet.
Since the time Jokowi came into office,
National Police officials, the legislature and others have been attempting to
defang the organization. But the pace has
picked up. After Jokowi withdrew Budi’s name from consideration for the top
post over the corruption allegations, the police are said to have reacted with
fury, spurred on, insiders say. In April, a Jakarta court used shaky legal
grounds to say the KPK had no right to charge Budi – the first time in the
13-year history of the agency that a trial court has intervened in an action.
The police took over the case against Budi and shortly after announced there
was no case.
The police have also gone after numerous KPK
officials, using a variety of cold cases and questionable charges to drag the
agency’s leading officials, including chairman Abraham Samad and his deputy
Bambang Widjojanto, into Indonesia’s notoriously corrupt courts. Dozens of
other officials are under threat.
With most of officialdom arrayed against the
KPK, Justice and Human Rights Minister Yasonna Laoly, a PDI-P member, announced
last week that he would submit the measure to the House of Representatives that
would cut the KPK’s powers, spurring Jokowi to summon Yasona to the
presidential palace to tell him he had no intention of revising the law, which
need to be included in this year’s docket of priority legislation.
“The government never proposed any amendments
to the KPK law,” Andi Wdjajanto, the cabinet secretary, told reporters in
Jakarta. “There are 37 bills included in the 2015 [priority package], 10 of
them submitted by the government. The KPK law isn’t among them.”
Pratikno, the state secretary, told reporters
separately that “the president has no intention of revising the KPK law” this
year.
Yasonna has previously said previously said it
was necessary to amend the existing law on the KPK, particularly on the extent
of its wiretapping powers, one of the primary weapons in the agency’s arsenal.
The original law was set up to deny the courts the ability to issue warrants,
giving the KPK the ability to listen in on suspects’ voice transmission without
being observed.
Yasonna also told reporters that the KPK’s
prosecutorial powers be “standardized” with those of the Attorney General’s
Office, and agency that is equally as corrupt as the police and which several
years ago attempted to frame KPK investigators on abuse of power charges, only
to be caught via a KPK wiretap.
Taufiequrachman Ruki, the interim KPK chairman,
urged that no attempt be made to weaken the commission, particularly with
regard to its wiretapping powers.
“Our principle is that we don’t agree with any
revision aimed at weakening the KPK. Whatever the proposed amendment, if its
intention is to undermine the fight against corruption, we will reject it,” he
told legislators. Asia Times
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