Anita Rachman – House of Representatives Speaker Marzuki Alie was expected to read out a brief end-of-year report before the close of the plenary session on Friday – marking the end of this legislature's second year in office.

Instead, Marzuki, saying he was out of time, simply handed out copies of his speech, which noted the challenges faced by the House, and asked lawmakers to read it themselves.

Lawmakers had already come under fire at the start of their second year. From accusations of plain incompetence and laziness to serious corruption allegations, there was never a shortage of criticism and scandals involving the institution or its members.

In his speech, Marzuki conceded the public had a poor perception of the legislature. He was concerned, he said, about the results of a recent news poll that showed how little trust the public had in the House.

"The three functions of the House – budgeting, monitoring and legislating – are still viewed as not being optimal by the people," he wrote. The House's working performance, Marzuki said, was being monitored by the public, "especially the legislative function."

While he reasoned that the House, as powerful an institution as it was, still did not have enough structural and administrative support, he concluded that lawmakers should answer the challenges they faced.

Ignatius Mulyono, chairman of the House Legislation Body, argued that the legislature had actually shown an improvement in its second year.

In its first year, lawmakers only managed to pass 13 bills. "But in the second year, we passed 17 bills and three laws on budgets," Ignatius said. "Making laws is difficult, it's not like running a company here."

Ignatius said by the end of the year, the House was expected to pass 17 more bills, making it 35 for 2011, "much better than last year, although our target is 70 laws."

Ronald Rofiandri, from the Center for Indonesian Law and Policy Studies (PSHK), said that while the number of bills passed was indeed higher this year, there had not been a corresponding improvement in the quality of laws.

The problem, he said, was that there was still no limit on the amount of time allowed for deliberations and poor coordination between the government and House created delays.

Sebastian Salang, from the Concerned Citizens for the Indonesian Legislature (Formappi), said its second year should have presented a golden opportunity for the House to show the public it had improved on its lackluster first year. But they failed to do so.

"Since they've admitted their weaknesses in their report, I don't think it shows any progress from the first year, in legislation, monitoring and budgeting," he said.

Ronald said the House had been beset by political bickering, citing several occasions when party factions dug in their heels on important issues. "And people have doubts on their monitoring teams. There have been no concrete results," he said, referring to the committees looking into the tax mafia and Bank Century bailout.

Sebastian said he hoped for a significant improvement in the lawmakers' third year, "because after that, they will busy campaigning for the next election."