Febriamy Hutapea, Nivell Rayda & Heru Andriyanto – Lawmakers should go back to looking after the people who voted for them instead of tending to bruised political egos.
That was the blunt advice handed out by economic and political analysts on Wednesday, a day after senior members of the House of Representatives said they would seek to ban Finance Minister Sri Mulyani Indrawati from House commission hearings, including upcoming deliberations on revisions to the 2010 budget.
Aviliani, an economist with the Institute for Development of Economics and Finance, said the House was facing a number of bills that needed urgent deliberation, pointing out that life should go on after the political mess left behind by the Bank Century scandal.
"Leave it to law enforcers to work on Century. Start work on the many bills that need to be passed into law to safeguard the country, particularly from possible financial crises in the future," Aviliani said on Wednesday.
She was referring to calls by legislators from the Golkar Party and the opposition Indonesian Democratic of Struggle (PDI-P) for a vote at the next House plenary session to bar Sri Mulyani, a move seen as a clear challenge to President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono after the inconclusive House probe.
A divided House voted last week that the government's Rp 6.7 trillion ($730 million) bailout in 2008 broke the law and was tainted with banking and corruption criminal allegations.
Aviliani said both the House and the government must work together to end problems over egos as they had the "urgent burden of fixing regulations," particularly those linked to the banking system and the nation's economy.
She added that the government must stop digging out "old legal cases" to take revenge against coalition members who voted against the ruling Democratic Party.
"The House has to seriously start deliberating not only the many banking and monetary bills, but also the JPSK bill, by April at least," she said, referring to the Financial System Safety Net (JPSK), which has remained untouched since it was issued in October 2008.
Irman Putra Sidin, a state administration expert, said the House should regard the Century case with the spirit of improving the country's regulations.
"The House is using the Bank Century case to tear down the circle of power, instead of as an example to improve the country's condition," Irman said, referring to the fact that Yudhoyono's Democratic Party-led coalition is in tatters following the House vote.
The Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK), meanwhile, said it had formed three teams to investigate the Bank Century scandal.
"One team will investigate the loan facility [FPJP] provided [to ailing lender Bank Century], another on the issuance of the bailout and [the third team] after the FPJP was issued," KPK deputy chairman Bibit Samad Rianto said.
"If there are indications of general or banking crimes then the findings will be forwarded to the National Police and the Attorney General's Office. But indications of corruption will be handled by the KPK," Bibit said.
On Wednesday, the commission summoned former Bank Century president director Hermanus Hasan Muslim. Hermanus was sentenced to three years in prison by the Central Jakarta District Court for his role in the failure of the bank. The court ruled that Hermanus had collaborated with co-defendant Robert Tantular, the former majority shareholder of the bank, to defraud Century customers and the government. Tantular was sentenced by the Jakarta High Court to five years imprisonment.
Eva Kusuma Sundari, who joined the House's special committee probing Century, supported claims by an antigraft group that the KPK in a court hearing had indicated an attempt to drop the investigation into the scandal.
The hearing was held at the request of nongovernmental organization Indonesian Anti-Corruption Society, which is suing the commission for a second time for inaction over the scandal.