Indonesian society is showing a growing intolerance toward corruption, deeply entrenched in virtually all levels of government and the provision of public services, but analysts say the aversion needs to be more widespread before the scourge of graft can be tackled effectively.
The Central Statistics Agency (BPS) said on Thursday that its annual Anti-Corruption Conduct Index had shown a slight improvement in 2013 from the year before, rising 0.8 points to 3.63 on a scale of 0 to 5. The higher the score, the less permissive society is toward corruption.
"Whereas before most people would have said they might overlook corruption, now they're saying they won't let it pass," Suryamin, the BPS chief, said at his office in Jakarta.
"For instance, we now see housewives starting to question where the money being brought home by their husbands is coming from." He attributed the growing distaste for corruption to the number of high-profile antigraft arrests made throughout 2013, for which the Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK) has earned high praise.
Suryamin also noted a higher aversion to graft among urban residents than rural ones – 3.71 on the index compared to 3.55 – indicating that an individual's level of education helped determine their stance toward corruption.
"What's really interesting is the strong correlation between education and antigraft sentiment. The higher a person's level of education, the higher they score on the index," he said. "So those with a bachelor's degree and higher tend to be, in general, against corruption."
The index was based on a survey of 10,000 households nationwide, conducted from Nov. 1-15 last year.
While the annual index, and the KPK's increasingly tough line on graft suspects, highlight a positive trend in the long-running campaign against corruption, public permissiveness toward the practice remains unacceptably high, says Siti Zuhro, a political analyst with the Indonesian Institute of Sciences (LIPI).
"Our biggest problem is that the public's political awareness remains low," she said on Thursday. If people were more knowledgeable about the political process, and hence the ways that politicians and public officials were circumventing or flouting it, then there would be a greater revulsion toward corruption, she argued.
She also said people remained far too permissive of the everyday corruption that they encountered, particularly in public services such as applying for a permit, getting medical care, or dealing with public school officials.
Standing up to the extortion and solicitation for bribes and illegal fees in such dealings should be the first step toward fighting corruption, Siti said. "If people don't do this, then they'll continue being the victims and targets of the worst aspects of the government bureaucracy," she said.
She cited the case of the myriad illegal fees levied on business owners by regional and central government officials, driving up their production costs.
"These hidden costs can amount to twice what businesses are paying their workers," Siti said, arguing that if these costs could be eliminated, the minimum wage could be doubled, thereby vastly improving the welfare of millions of households nationwide.