Devi Asmarani, Jakarta – A major shake-up of courts in Jakarta and other big cities is in the offing. Judges and prosecutors will be reshuffled as public pressure builds up to wipe out corruption in the legal system.
Justice and Human Rights Minister Yusril Ihza Mahendra told reporters yesterday: "We are in the process of talking with the Supreme Court about the shake-up." He said there would also be a "strict watch" on judges in large cities like Makassar and Medan, where many trials are marred by corruption and bribery.
Several judges are being investigated by his ministry and the Supreme Court, including two judges in west Jakarta and one in south Sulawesi, he said. Also under probe for accepting bribes are three Commercial Court judges, in the case involving Canadian-owned insurance company Manulife, who have been removed from their posts.
Next week, the ministry will begin probing the conduct of several judges presiding over the million-dollar corruption cases involving banks which allegedly misused loans from the central bank in 1999, he said.
In a ruling that was called unjust, the Central Jakarta District Court last week acquitted the owner of Bank Modern, Mr Samadikun Hartono, from charges of misusing 169 billion rupiah loans from Bank Indonesia.
Anti-corruption activists have demanded an investigation into the conduct of the judges and the prosecutors who had pressed for only a year's jail sentence.
Many other suspects in various bank loan scams have similarly got away with light sentences of between eight months and one year. Those who did receive longer jail sentences were tried in absentia as they had fled overseas before the trial began.
Mr Yusril said that apart from judges, the attorney general should also investigate corrupt prosecutors and lawyers. "It is impossible for the Justice and Human Rights Ministry to clean up the legal system if the prosecutors and lawyers are still corrupt," he said.
But some judges told The Straits Times that they felt victimised by the bad publicity. Supreme Court Judge Toton Suprapto told The Straits Times: "The majority of the some 6,000 judges in Indonesia are clean. If a small percentage is corrupt, don't blame all of us." He said the judges were feeling "terrorised and besieged" and warned that it could affect their judgements in court.
Judge Toton, who heads the Association of Indonesian Judges, also warned that if some allegations of corruption were concluded "too prematurely", they could implicate innocent judges.
A District Court judge said the planned shake-up was Mr Yusril's strategy to win public support for his political ambitions. Mr Yusril, who heads the Muslim-based Crescent Star Party, is one of the presidential hopefuls for the 2004 election.
The country's justice system has lately attracted a rash of criticism from notable figures including United States Secretary of State Colin Powell and UN special rapporteur Param Cumaraswamy.