Heru Andriyanto – Of all the challenges in the country's fight against corruption, the so-called court mafia – where defendants pay law enforcers to get a favorable court verdict – remains the toughest to beat, a noted antigraft campaigner said on Wednesday.
"Rampant bribery at courts has become the biggest stumbling block for the anticorruption campaign, primarily at the district level," said Danang Widoyoko, the head of Indonesia Corruption Watch. "Many district officials were acquitted of graft charges after they paid prosecutors and judges," he said.
The government has set up supervisory agencies, such as the Public Prosecution Commission and the Judicial Commission, to scrutinize the conduct of judges and prosecutors, as well as the National Police Commission. "But these commissions encounter strong resistance from law enforcers," Danang said.
He cited the controversial Supreme Court Law, passed by the House of Representatives late last year, which he said limited the Judicial Commission's authority to that of a "mere consultancy agency." "The commission is not allowed to deliver sanctions on judges – it can only make recommendations to the Supreme Court," he said.
While the Anti-Corruption Court is relatively immune to bribery, general courts across the country are still highly vulnerable, Danang said. According to ICW data, criminal courts have acquitted 659 out of 1,421 defendants in corruption cases between 2005 and 2008. Those convicted of graft were given lenient jail terms, with the average duration being 5.8 months.
In contrast, the Anti-Corruption Court has so far convicted all defendants, with an average sentence of four years jail.
In one of the most recent cases, the Attorney General's Office suspended one of its prosecutors for allegedly accepting a bribe from a defendant.
Prosecutor Sultoni recommended a one-year jail term for a defendant in a drug-trafficking case, a crime punishable by death, after a trial lasting just two days. It is alleged that Sultoni accepted a Rp 5 billion ($465,000) bribe.