Markus Junianto Sihaloho & Anita Rachman, Jakarta – Legislators should be ashamed of their poor attendance record at plenary sessions, and must strive to live up to their billing as the people's representatives, political observers said on Thursday in response to new data on absenteeism rates.
Indonesian Survey institute (LSI) political analyst Burhanuddin Muhtadi said low attendance has been a problem for years.
An LSI survey in September 2009 showed only 41.4 percent of respondents considered legislators diligent, while the majority saw them as truants.
"Such behavior is tantamount to treason," Burhanuddin said. "They violate their own ethical codes, wasting taxpayer money, and lie to their constituents."
The House of Representatives Secretariat has just released data on legislators' attendance at plenary sessions since October.
From October to December 2009, National Mandate Party (PAN) lawmakers had the best attendance rate, with 96 percent.
Two other Islam-based parties prop up the other end of the list: the National Awakening Party (PKB) at 86.6 percent and the Prosperous Justice Party (PKS) at 88.6 percent.
In the House's second sitting period, between January and March 2010, President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono's Democrats led with a 91.1 percent attendance rate, while the PKB and the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P) were last with 78.3 percent and 79.9 percent, respectively.
Sebastian Salang, from the group Concerned Citizens for the Indonesian Legislature (Formappi), said that laws in place since 2009 to ensure full attendance at plenary meetings have not been enforced.
A House regulation stipulates that legislators missing three straight plenary meetings are to be publicly denounced.
"In Indonesia, though, this threat is meaningless," Sebastian said. "In any other country legislators would be ashamed of such a denouement, but not here. Maybe we need to put their names up on huge billboards at traffic intersections."
The House's Ethics Council is also authorized to dismiss legislators missing six straight plenary sessions.
"But the Ethics Council is dead in the water right now because of internal squabbling," Sebastian pointed out.
The House defines a plenary session as one where the quorum of at least 281 of the House's 560 legislators are present. However, Sebastian said it was common to see legislators turn up to sign the attendance sheet and then leave.
He added that the payment of Rp 1.5 million ($165) to each legislator attending a meeting where a bill is passed was proving useless.
"They already have so many allowances and facilities that this amount is meaningless to them," he said. House Deputy Speaker Anis Matta, from the PKS, said the poor attendance was not symptomatic of legislators' laziness.
"I believe it's because we do so much work," he said, adding that the PKS was considering punishing absentee legislators.
Marwan Jaffar, from the PKB, said most of the party's legislators came from outside Jakarta and found the capital "not homey enough."
He added they also served in provincial party posts, and had to split their time in the provinces. "But I always remind them to attend plenary meetings or face tough sanctions."
Romahurmuzy, from the United Development Party (PPP), said the low attendance in the first year of the House's sitting was very concerning, as absenteeism was usually a final-year phenomenon.
"We recommend financial incentives based on each legislator's physical attendance at meetings, where the attendance sheet is handed out twice – at the beginning and the end of the meeting," he said.
Democrat Ramadhan Pohan said the president took the issue seriously. "Democrats must have a very good reason for skipping a meeting, and even then they need a note," he said.
The PDI-P's Tjahjo Kumolo agreed that those not planning to attend a meeting should give prior written notice.
Ethics Council chairman Nudirman Munir said the council was currently collecting data on chronically absent legislators with a plan to discipline them.
"The rules are clear, so there's no excuse to keep skipping meetings and not expect to be dismissed," he said. "However, not all legislators do it deliberately. Some have valid reasons, so we need to crosscheck the data with each party to see who's really playing truant."
Nudirman said the errant legislators would then be formally notified of their offense.
House Legislative Body chairman Ignatius Mulyono said it was increasingly difficult to meet the quorum for plenary sessions.
"We're compromising by starting the plenary meetings an hour later, but many legislators still show up late or not at all," he said. "Plus, it doesn't help if any of the various oversight commissions are holding hearings at the same time."
Monday's plenary session barely met the quorum, with only 284 legislators turning up. That figure, Ignatius said, was similar to previous plenary sessions. He added that even then, not all of those who signed the attendance list stayed on for the duration of the meeting.
He said that while he understood some legislators might have double duties in the House, serving on oversight commissions or panels, it should not be an excuse for absences.
"We're elected by the people to serve on their behalf, so it's plain wrong to skip meetings," Ignatius said, adding that poor attendance was a main factor for the lack of legislation passed by the House since last October.
"That's a no-brainer," Ignatius said. "It takes time to pass proper legislation, and if you're not there to deliberate it, what can you expect?"
He called for a revamp of the attendance system by installing fingerprint clock-in devices to ensure legislators really did attend meetings that they claimed to have been present for.
Eva Kusuma Sundari, from the PDI-P, said that while she had skipped plenary meetings in the past, she always had a good reason. "I only did it because I had something else to do that I believed was more important."
She added that legislators' performance should not be assessed only through their attendance record but also through the "significant contributions they make."
"We need to consider what each legislator contributed to a particular bill," Eva said. "What's the point of showing up to a plenary session if you don't say a thing?"