Slamet Susanto and Wahyoe Boediwardhana, Yogyakarta/Surabaya – A number of bureaucrats officially declared their disengagement with corrupt practices by signing "integrity pacts", although anticorruption activists doubted their commitment.
As many as 125 officials from the Yogyakarta municipal administration and legislative council signed the pact on Wednesday as part of their campaign for bureaucracy reform. They vowed not to commit corruption, collusion and nepotism and to stay away from drugs.
The officials comprised heads of regency administration agencies, heads of divisions, district heads, subdistrict heads and municipal councilors.
The signing ceremony was symbolically carried out by several top officials including Mayor Haryadi Suyuti, Deputy Mayor Imam Priyono, municipal legislative council's deputy speaker Sinarbiyat Nujanat and Deputy Administrative Reforms Minister Ismail Mohammad.
The pact consists of seven points requiring its signatories to proactively prevent and eradicate corruption, collusion and nepotism practices, to never ask for bribes, to build commitments to maintain accountability, to avoid conflicts of interest and to become a model for adherence to regulations.
Apart from the seven points, the municipal administration has also added new points, including the ones on commitments against illegal drug use.
The declaration came a day after such a move had been initiated by East Java officials.
On Tuesday, they established what they called a corruption-free integrity zone, marked with the signing of an integrity pact between the governor and 38 regents and mayors from across the province. The signing of the pact, which took place at the Negara Grahadi building in Surabaya, was witnessed by Administrative Reforms Minister Azwar Abubakar and Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK) deputy chairman Busyro Muqoddas.
Two agencies included in the first integrity zone are the East Java Transportation Office's Weigh Station Technical Implementation Unit (UPT) and the East Java Investment Board's Integrated Licensing Service UPT.
East Java Governor Soekarwo expressed hopes the signing of the integrity pact would improve public services. According to Busyro, the presence of the integrity zone in the scope of public services is part of an effort to prevent corruption as mandated by the 2010-2015 National Corruption Eradication Strategy.
However, the move received a cool response from the East Java Anticorruption Working Network (JKAK), which claimed the declaration only paid lip service to anticorruption efforts.
According to JKAK coordinator Lutfi Jayadi Kurniawan, the most important matter was to set an accountability parameter on public services in East Java, so members of community could assess directly and openly information on all the services they receive.
JKAK argued that the two agencies chosen in the corruption-free integrity zone did not represent public services, because according to the public services law, basic public services include healthcare, education and civil administration.
"The choice of the weigh station UPT and Investment Board Integrated Licensing Service UPT is because they are concerned only about the province's sources of income, but not public services," said Lutfi.