Anita Rachman – The deputy house speaker is tackling the House of Representatives chronic absentee lawmaker problem head-on. He is urging the House Secretary hand over attendance lists to the House Ethics Council.

"The lists must be released. Lawmakers are public officials and, therefore, the public has the right to know," Pramono Anung, the deputy speaker of the House, also known as the DPR, said on Wednesday. "The public needs to know whether the individuals they have voted for are actually diligent or not."

Pramono acknowledged that the country's legislators had a long history of poor attendance at meetings and plenary sessions.

The House has previously faced a steady stream of criticism for the slow pace of its work, blamed in large part on legislators' poor attendance. This is in spite of legislators receiving salaries and allowances in excess of Rp 51 million ($6,000) a month, as the Jakarta Globe reported in May.

"Why are we paying them that much for their poor performances?" Roy Salam, of the Indonesian Budget Center, said at the time.

Pramono said the initiative to reveal the attendance list was part of the effort to force lawmakers to fulfill their responsibilities as representatives of the Indonesian people.

"I am one of the people who thinks the attendance list must not get hidden," Pramono said. "I will ask for the names of those that have skipped meetings, hearings and especially plenary sessions. These names will then be passed to the House Ethics Council."

House Ethics Council deputy chairman Nudirman Munir previously stated that the council had also asked the House Secretary to release the attendance list, though it is yet to do so.

However, Pramono said the House Secretary should not release the list directly to the public, saying it should first be handed to the Ethics Council, who would then release the information to the public.