Rizky Amelia, Anita Rachman & Ezra Sihite – In their first official day on the job, the new leaders of Indonesia's antigraft agency have proposed a radical merging of three key laws to assist in the fight against corruption.
Bambang Widjojanto, a deputy chairman of the Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK), said on Monday that they were considering the idea of integrating the laws on corruption, taxation and money laundering.
He said the proposal was raised in light of the fact that the KPK at present was not allowed to charge graft suspects under the other laws if it had not already charged them under the corruption law.
"For instance, we can press money laundering charges to support corruption charges against a suspect, but we can't press just the money laundering charges alone," Bambang said.
This is problematic, he went on, given the interconnectedness of corruption, money laundering and tax fraud. He said integrating the laws could result in heavier sentences being handed down to graft convicts.
"When they commit their crimes, it's usually a three-in-one: corruption, money laundering and tax violations. Three sins from one crime," Bambang said. "So if we could integrate these three laws into one, that would be interesting and make law enforcement more effective."
The proposal received the backing of the Financial Transaction Reports and Analysis Center (PPATK), the country's anti-money laundering watchdog.
Muhammad Yusuf, the PPATK chairman, said it was important that the KPK be allowed to fully integrate the money laundering law into its cases, including in the ongoing prosecution of high-profile graft suspect and former Democratic Party treasurer Muhammad Nazaruddin.
"I previously asked the KPK to bring money laundering charges against Nazaruddin, but they didn't do it," he said.
Nazaruddin is accused of bid-rigging in awarding the contract to build an athletes' village for last month's Southeast Asian Games. He is currently standing trial for allegedly taking Rp 4.67 billion ($514,000) in bribes from the winning contractor.
Bambang and Yusuf were speaking at a ceremony on Monday to mark the KPK's official hand-over of leadership, from the commission headed by Busyro Muqoddas to a revamped quintet under new the chairman, Abraham Samad.
Abraham vowed not to let any pending graft cases go cold and said the new KPK leadership would "step up" the fight against corruption.
He declined to single out any particular cases to be prioritized, such as the Bank Century bailout, saying that setting a target would not be helpful. "There are no targets to work toward. If there were, this would be politics," he said.
Separately, Fahri Hamzah, a member of the House of Representatives' special committee monitoring the investigation into the bailout, said he hoped to get the case back into the spotlight following the House's end-of-year recess.
"Our first order of business will be to focus on the ongoing law enforcement probes and demand that the new KPK leadership deliver," he said. He also said he hoped the new leaders would not stall in their investigation of the case.
Parallel probes by the KPK, Attorney General's Office and police into the bailout process and flow of funds have so far uncovered no indication of graft and only minor banking violations.
Muhammadiyah, the country's second-largest Islamic organization, also called on Abraham to zero in on the Century case during his first 100 days in office.
"Focus on Century and the other high-profile cases," said Din Syamsuddin, the Muhammadiyah chairman. "Don't wait for people to come to you. Go out and seek them." However, he also urged the public to give the new KPK leaders time to get their bearings and support them in carrying out their job.