RI sees no improvement in corruption index

The country’s efforts to eradicate corruption have shown no significant progress over the past year, according to Transparency International’s latest Corruption Perception Index (CPI) 2010 released Tuesday.Indonesia’s score remained 2.8 out of 10, the same last year. It ranked 110 out of 178 countries. In 2009 it placed 111th out of 180 countries.

Transparency International Indonesia chairman Todung Mulya Lubis said he was “shocked” that Indonesia had not scored lower. “I thought Indonesia’s score would be lower than 2.8 due to the country’s poor performance in weeding out corruption in the past year,” he added.

He pointed the finger at the roller coaster ride of adversity that the Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK) has gone through this year. He cited discord between the KPK and the police force for crippling the nation’s fight against corruption.

Many believe the police’s move to incriminate two KPK deputy leaders, Bibit Samad Rianto and Chandra M. Hamzah, who were accused of taking bribes from a businessman, was an attempt to weaken the antigraft body.

“This is a battle between two ideologies, that of anticorruption and pro-corruption,” he added. “Antigraft institutions have been systemically weakened by stripping them of their legal power and authorities.

They are also being infiltrated by outside interests that don’t support the fight against corruption. ”The respondents, he said, “must have been too generous” in assessing Indonesia.

Todung also pointed out that Indonesia was still a far cry from meeting its target of improving its CPI score to 5.0 by 2015.

“I’m not confident that we will achieve this target. The government’s hesitation in strengthening law enforcement institutions, including the police force, the Attorney General’s Office, the KPK and judicial courts will be a stumbling block in achieving a score of 5.0 in 2015,” he said.

A lawmaker from the House of Representatives’ Commission III overseeing legal affairs, Aziz Syamsudin, slammed the government for its failure to improve the country’s CPI score.

“Law enforcement institutions are still not integrated with each other in the fight against corruption,” he said.

He said the government should not focus only on curative approaches in its effort to eradicate corruption, but instead on preventive approaches.

In the 2010 CPI, Indonesia shared 110th place with Bolivia, Gabon and Kosovo. It fared slightly better than neighboring Vietnam (2.7 and 116th), Timor Leste (2.5 and 127th) and the Philippines (2.4 and 134th).

Indonesia, however, lags behind Brunei Darussalam (5.5 and 38th), Malaysia (4.4 and 56th) and Thailand (3.5 and 78th).

The US ranked 22 with a score of 7.1 and China ranked 78 with a 3.5 rating. 


(TheJakartaPost | Transperancy International)