Heru Andriyanto – The National Police's pledge to provide clarification on the suspicious bank accounts of some of its senior officers appears to be nothing more than a PR statement, antigraft campaigners said on Sunday, slamming the force for ignoring public concern over the issue and its failure to conduct internal reform.

"Friday's statement was a big disappointment," said Boyamin Saiman, chairman of non-governmental group Indonesian Anti-Corruption Society (Maki).

"The National Police have been given a second chance to restore their credibility, but again they just simply ignored the public outrage over reports of suspicious bank accounts belonging to high-ranking officers," he said.

The police announced on Friday that they had received reports from the Financial Transaction Reports and Analysis Center (PPATK) about the bank accounts of 23 officers, but said only two of them allegedly received funds from illegal sources.

The two were identified as Comr. Martin Reno, an officer with the Papua Police who has already been tried in relation to his suspicious account, and disgruntled Comr. Gen. Susno Duadji, who is being detained on graft charges for allegedly accepting Rp 500 million ($55,000) from a suspected case broker.

After Susno alleged that policemen, prosecutors and judges had taken bribes from taxman Gayus Tambunan in order to clear him of money laundering and graft charges, it seemed that the police were about to initiate a major overhaul. However, the public was ultimately disappointed after two generals, as well as several prosecutors, managed to escape charges.

"Now [the police] are focusing on an already convicted officer and a general who is being regarded as an enemy of the institution. We cannot expect anything of great significance to come from that kind of response," Boyamin said.

"The only body that can take the appropriate action over the officers' suspicious accounts is the Corruption Eradication Commission [KPK], which has supervisory authority over other law agencies when it comes to corruption cases. Now we are awaiting a response from the commission."

The police possess more power since their separation from the military, but while the latter has to some extent carried out internal reforms and terminated "inappropriate policies" like military businesses, the police have done little in this regard, Boyamin said.

"The sizeable police accounts may derive from individual businesses as they claimed, but even so, the businesses relate to their position of authority. It's safer to secure business deals with someone who holds authority in law enforcement, so officers who have huge sums of money in their accounts from business are still liable to graft investigation," Boyamin said. "And, of course, we must rule out the possibility that the money stemmed from their handling of criminal cases involving high-profile figures."

However, another antigraft campaigner, Zainal Arifin Muchar, a law lecturer at Gadjah Mada University, believed the police were unlikely to hand the case on to other law agencies.

"This is a money laundering case by nature and the only agency that can initiate an investigation into that is the police," Zainal told the Jakarta Globe.

"Yes, the police response in the case has been disappointing, but the case falls under their authority. I suggest that the PPATK and the [Judicial Mafia Eradication] Task Force play a bigger role."