Ade Ridwan Yandwiputra, Jakarta – Indonesia's Corruption Perception Index, or CPI, has improved to 37, boosting its ranking to 99 out of 180 countries, from the previous 115 ranking. Nevertheless, Indonesia Corruption Watch (ICW) flagged declining scores across three CPI data sources.
These indicators are the use of public resources for personal interests, political corruption involving the three branches of power, and bribery in business activities such as exports, imports, and public contract acquisitions.
"Indonesia's score remains lower than its highest score ever, which was 40 in 2019," said Wana Alamsyah, Coordinator of the ICW Knowledge Management Division, in his official statement on Wednesday, February 12, 2025.
Wana said Indonesia's improved score is not a strong enough indication that the country's anti-corruption climate is getting better, especially with the various government policies that are vulnerable to corruption.
Transparency International calculates the corruption index from a scale of 0 to 100, with 0 being highly corrupt and 100 meaning very clean.
This Indonesian CPI is calculated from nine data sources that serve as indicators, namely:
- Political Risk Service: 33
- IMB Business School World Competitiveness Yearbook: 45
- Global Insight Country Risk Rating: 32
- World Economic Forum Executive Opinion Survey: 61
- Bertelsmann Stiftung Transformation Index: 39
- Economist Intelligence Unit Country Risk Service: 35
- Political and Economic Risk Consultancy: 38
- Varieties of Democracy Project: 22
- World Justice Project Rule of Law Index: 26
According to Wana, the increase in the 2024 CPI score is primarily due to the addition of the World Economic Forum (WEF) indicator, which last entered the CPI indicator in 2021. WEF is an indicator that measures how common it is for companies to make unrecorded additional payments or bribes.
Although the WEF score in 2024 significantly increased compared to the score from 2012-2021, the existence of this indicator needs to be noted as a new indicator that emerged because Indonesia responded to the survey, the quality of which is still of concern after a two-year hiatus. "Global Insight Country Risk Ratings in 2024 dropped 15 points compared to 2023," Wana said.
Wana mentioned that this indicator concerns the risk of bribery in imports/exports, acquiring public contracts, and conducting other business activities.
Another indicator related to the 2024 corruption index theme is the Varieties of Democracy Project,, which assesses political corruption indicators involving the executive, legislative, and judiciary reflected in the corruption of natural resources in Indonesia.
"ICW's study on extractive businesses and renewable energy behind Prabowo-Gibran shows that companies in the extractive sector have strong relations with elected officials to secure their businesses," said Wana.
Local governments and the executive grant extractive permits; company owners are given the red-carpet treatment by the legislature and the judiciary's bias towards companies during trials.
Despite Indonesia's score, the country's corruption ranking still falls behind its neighboring Southeast Asian countries. For example, Timor Leste is ranked 73rd with a score of 44, Vietnam is ranked 88th with a score of 40, and Malaysia is ranked 57th with a score of 50. Meanwhile, Singapore is ranked 3rd with a score of 84. On the other hand, Indonesia's score is significantly below the global average of 43 points.