The fruits of reforms, initiated almost 15 years ago, have been visible in the checks and balances that work in our political system, fairer business competition and perhaps protection of human rights. But the way a graft convict could defy the enforcement of the law against him on Wednesday and ironically receive backing from law enforcers has cast doubt over whether the much vaunted reformasi has really occurred in our justice system so that everybody stands equal before the law.
Former National Police detectives chief Comr. Gen. (ret) Susno Duadji was given shelter inside the headquarters of West Java Police, which he led for nine months in 2008. The provincial police chief, Insp. Gen. Tubagus Anis Angka Wijaya, justified the custodianship of Susno on the grounds that he was a citizen who had "the right to protection" – a stark contrast to the police's inaction when members of minority groups in the country come under attacks from hardline vigilantes despite their constitutional rights as citizens to protection.
Susno had called Tubagus to ask for shelter and was later escorted from his home in a hilly up-market housing complex north of Bandung to the police headquarters, foiling state prosecutors' attempts to take him to prison. Previously Susno had three times disobeyed the prosecutors' summons to surrender himself to serve a 3.5-year jail sentence.
The Supreme Court had turned down the appeal Susno had filed against a lower court's verdict, which found him guilty of accepting Rp 500 million (US$51,000) in bribes and misappropriating state funds allocated for election security funds.
But it was the wording of the Supreme Court's ruling that provided Susno and his lawyers with ammunition to keep on fighting. Unlike in other verdicts, the Supreme Court said nothing about the jail term Susno had to serve. Susno had challenged the Jakarta High Court's guilty verdict at the Supreme Court on an administrative error.
To the public at large the mistakes may appear honest and trivial, but for Susno and his advocates they looked like the Achilles heel that they could exploit to keep him from prison. Susno is on the list of legislative candidates submitted by the Muslim-based Crescent Star Party founded by Yusril Ihza Mahendra, who is also one of Susno's lawyers. If Susno had to serve the jail term, he would be unable to contest the legislative election which is scheduled for April next year.
The precedent for a graft convict to resist imprisonment was set with the reelected Aru regent Teddy Tengko, also a client of Yusril. Last December state prosecutors released Teddy after arresting him in Jakarta also due to legal confusion resulting from the Supreme Court's failure to order his immediate imprisonment. Until now Teddy remains in office in Maluku despite his graft conviction. Earlier this month he was elected chairman of the Golkar Party's local branch.
Yusril, a constitutional law professor, has challenged the prosecutors' attempts to enforce the Supreme Court's guilty verdicts on Susno and Teddy, referring to a judicial review he filed with the Constitutional Court against the Law on Criminal Court Procedures. While the Constitutional Court has said there is no reason for Susno, Teddy or other convicts to evade their jail terms merely because of the absence of a stipulation on jail terms, Yusril insisted that the court's verdict which was issued in March could not be enforced retroactively, in this case against his clients.
The legal dispute does indeed concern technicalities, but in law enforcement certainty counts. There have been cases of court verdicts or indictments which lacked clarity or were sloppy in their draft paving the way for a defendant's acquittal or convicts evading imprisonment.
People like Susno and Teddy are fortunate because they have access to power that enables them to seek every avenue to get justice, which sadly eludes those who are weaker and less vocal. The sooner this blatant obstruction of justice is addressed, the better.