Indonesia’s embattled graft-busters seek military help

Indonesia’s widely respected and currently beleaguered anti-corruption agency is reaching out to the country’s controversial armed forces for support, apparently to bolster its defenses against a National Police force that has harassed, arrested and threatened its officials in a months-long dispute.

The Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK) is dependent on the National Police for investigators assigned to the agency. But when the KPK charged police general Budi Gunawan with corruption in January after he was nominated to be national police chief, a simmering dislike erupted into bitter and open conflict between the two agencies. Police investigators inside the KPK are under increasing pressure as a result.

Now it looks like the military could be dragged into the fray. This week, Indonesian Military spokesman Maj. Gen. Fuad Basya was quoted saying that the KPK was asking military commanders for help recruiting military investigators to work with the agency, apparently because police personnel can no longer be trusted and are becoming harder to find.

“The KPK leaders explained their wishes to recruit TNI investigators,” Fuad said on Tuesday. “In principle we are ready to assist the KPK. If needed, we will provide [the KPK] with our best men.”

Who ya gonna call?

When the police were split off from the military the wake of the fall of former President Suharto, the hope was that military reforms would take root and the TNI’s history of human rights abuses and massive corruption through a vast web of state-owned companies would gradually fade away. While the human rights situation has improved, most observers see the military as still wielding enormous power – although not on the scale seen during the Suharto era.

It may come down, for the KPK and its supporters, to a choice of lesser evils – the fearsome military or a massively corrupt National Police force that see itself as above the law and has the political support of Megawati and others to enforce its will against a weak president.

“Given the current situation between the KPK and police, it’s quite understandable that the KPK is seeking help from other institutions besides police and the AGO [Attorney General’s Office],” said Hendardi, the chairman of the Setara Institute, a well-known NGO that works on issues like corruption and religious tolerance.

It is also well to remember that President Joko’s single strongest ally in government is his powerful and astute chief of staff, Luhut Panjaitan, a retired general who maintains considerable support in the active duty military. Some insiders have speculated for some time that the military – through Luhut – might prove to be Joko’s trump card as a counterweight to the police.

Both Megawati and Kalla opposed Luhut’s appointment to the post, seeing him as a political threat to their own interests.

For now, there is little likelihood of the Special Forces immediately marching into the KPK’s Jakarta office to put things right. An existing law intended to reform the way things were done under Suharto bars active duty officers from working in civilian agencies other than Defense, Intelligence and Search and Rescue.

“The most likely scenario is to wait for a revision of the Law on State Agencies,” said the military spokesman, Fuad. – Rappler.com

This is an excerpt of a story that appears in Asia Sentinel. Read the full story here.