A former prisoner revealed on Metro TV on Tuesday the systematic abuse faced by new prison inmates unless they are able to provide security money payments to guarantee their own welfare.

Speaking live on air while wearing a mask, the former prisoner from the Salemba Detention Center in Central Jakarta added more fuel to the fire currently surrounding revelations over special privileges for inmates with money.

The anonymous prisoner, nicknamed Mr X, said that new inmates were often forced to pay security money or risk being beaten daily.

"There are inmates who we called 'tamping.' Their job is to assist the prison guards so they know if there are new inmates. When I was new, I was asked for money but I didn't have any. The consequences were painful, I was beaten up every day," he said.

Mr X said he later joined the tamping and collected various kinds of fees from inmates. "From security money alone, my friends and I got between Rp 500,000 ($50) to Rp 1 million every day. We split the money with the guards," he said.

As for privileges like air-conditioned cells, a special fee was charged. "The most expensive fee for privileges like AC was Rp 2 million a month, but everything is negotiable," he said.

"Sometimes we're the ones who offered the privileges. Whatever they needed, we could provide it. Money talks."

Meanwhile, following the discovery of luxurious cells at Pondok Bambu Women's Detention Center on Sunday by the judicial mafia eradication task force, the Minister of Justice and Human Rights suspended the detention center's director, Sarju Wibowo, on Tuesday.