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Jokowi said to cave to Kalla on issue of watering down KPK law
Jakarta Globe - June 23, 2015
The bill, a package of amendments to the 2002 Law on the Corruption Eradication Commission, or KPK, was on Tuesday formally included in the docket of priority legislation, or Prolegnas, for this year, during a plenary session of the House of Representatives.
President Joko, whose advisers insisted was against any effort to amend the law on the KPK in the near term, apparently caved in to the persuasion of Vice President Jusuf Kalla, who painted the KPK's fearsome reputation as discouraging government officials from administering much-needed development projects, according to a spokesman.
"J.K. basically said it was necessary [to amend the KPK law] so that government officials aren't afraid to get things done when the KPK is around," Husain Abdullah, a spokesman for the vice president, told reporters in Jakarta on Tuesday.
"Keep in mind that a lot of officials are scared of the KPK even before a project gets underway. And if we don't get things like infrastructure projects started right away, when else can we start?"
Kalla earlier his year trotted out a similar argument – justifying bending established regulations for the sake of expediting a power plant construction project – when testifying in the corruption trial of a party colleague, who was later acquitted of all charges.
Husain said that Joko was "of the same mind" as Kalla on the issue of amending the KPK law. "Both of them feel it's necessary. The president accepted the explanation, according to J.K.," Husain said.
The statement contradicts all previous remarks by officials close to Joko, who said the president was adamant that the KPK law should not be included in this year's Prolegnas.
"The president's most recent stance is that he has no intention of revising the law," Pratikno, the state secretary, told reporters last Friday. "The government never proposed any amendments to the KPK law," added Andi Widjajanto, the cabinet secretary.
The submission of the bill to the House is seen by some as the latest effort by Joko's party, the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle, or PDI-P, to undermine the KPK, which has prosecuted and jailed more PDI-P politicians than those from any other party throughout its 12-year history.
Yasonna Laoly, the justice minister from the PDI-P, said it was necessary to amend the law to give the antigraft body's activities a sound legal basis.
He said the most pressing matter was to define the extent of the KPK's wiretapping powers – something that legislators have repeatedly tried to curtail in the past, to no avail. The KPK's success rate in going after corruption suspects has been attributed in part to its ability to listen in on suspects' phone calls without the need to obtain a warrant from Indonesia's notoriously corrupt judiciary.
Yasonna also said there needed to be a "standardization" of the KPK's prosecutorial powers with those of the Attorney General's Office. The KPK is currently the only body apart from the AGO authorized to prosecute corruption cases, and boasts a near-100 percent conviction rate.
Kalla, whose policy views have aligned less with Joko's than with those of the president's political patron, the PDI-P chairwoman Megawati Soekarnoputri, argued that the KPK's high success rate in going after corrupt officials was the very reason its powers needed to be scaled back.
He said that despite so many governors and ministers being jailed for graft over the past decade, there seemed to be no end to corruption scandals coming to light, and for that a rethink of the KPK's powers was warranted.
"If the Constitution can be amended [then so can the KPK law]," he said on Monday. "The only things that can't be amended are the Koran [...] and the Bible."
The frequent disagreements between the president and vice president on key issues have not gone unnoticed, with a senior legislator suggesting it was time for Joko to dump Kalla – who is said to have been foisted on Joko by Megawati ahead of last year's election in exchange for campaign funding from a prominent business lobby.
Ruhut Sitompul, from the Democratic Party, said Kalla had exhibited a similar rebellious streak when he served as vice president to the Democrats' Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono.
"J.K. also used to express different views during SBY's time as president. That's why he was never picked up again" as vice president for Yudhoyono's second term, Ruhut said.
He added that Kalla should realize that the Indonesian public had voted for Joko as president, and that as such he should dial down his insubordination. "When he comes up for re-election, Joko won't run with J.K. again," Ruhut warned.
Source: http://thejakartaglobe.beritasatu.com/news/jokowi-said-cave-kalla-issue-watering-kpk-law/.
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