Indonesia Police Watch (IPW) has urged the Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK) to commence investigations into five men it alleges are now controlling major Indonesian Police procurement projects. IPW chairman Neta S. Pane said on Wednesday that the five individuals, identified only by their initials TS, R, S, MA and M, controlled some 80 percent of the police’s 2013 spending plan, totaling Rp 1.8 trillion (US$185.4 million). “TS controls the communication and IT device procurement projects worth Rp 250 billion, while R controls the vehicle procurement arm worth Rp 258 billion,” he said.
Neta added that S controlled the equipment procurement for the criminal unit worth Rp 600 billion; M controlled the Rp 312 billion intelligence unit and animals procurement projects; and MA controlled the procurement of ships and detection devices. The police had actually put the names of the five individuals on the blacklist due to their incompetence, he said. “TS handled the communication and IT device procurement projects, which received bad-press due to project markups. M was blacklisted due to problems at the police’s traffic unit and the National Narcotics Agency [BNN],” Neta said.
The men were able to claw their way back and regain control as they had three lawmakers from two political parties at the House of the Representatives (DPR) supporting them, he said, without disclosing the names of the parties. The men also enjoyed close relationships with some high-ranking police officials. The police officials who placed their names on the blacklist had retired and so, according to Neta, the police are powerless to prevent the men from controlling the police’s procurement projects, despite corruption causing the 2013 police spending plan to fly through the roof.
According to the watchdog, the police allocate in their spending plan Rp 468 million for horses, Rp 150 million for dogs, Rp 28 million for laptops, Rp 7 million for external hard disks, Rp 16 million for personal computers, Rp 8 million for pocket cameras, Rp 65 million for DSLR cameras, Rp 2.2 billion for audio video equipment and Rp 29 million for handy-cams. Indonesian Police spokesmen Brig. Gen. Boy Rafli Amar and Insp. Gen. Suhardi Alius were not available and did not return calls from The Jakarta Post to comment on the IPW’s latest allegations.
The police defended their plan to spend the astronomical amount of money, claiming that the prices are reasonable. The National Police’s general planning and development assistant Ins. Gen. Sulistyo Ishak recently said that the prices of listed items — such as horses, dogs, cars and laptops — were based on market value. Neta said that the police had to be open about the specification of those facilities, citing external hard disks as an example — highest quality of which only costs Rp 3 million each. Unsatisfied by the explanation, the IPW has urged the KPK to start the investigation into the troubled procurement projects as soon as possible.
However, the KPK declined to do so, arguing that they needed to obtain evidence of misappropriation before launching an investigation, although they welcomed the watchdog to submit its data and report the case to the anti-graft body. “If the IPW submits the data to us, then we could validate the data [before launching an investigation],” KPK spokesperson Johan Budi told the Post on Wednesday.
source : the jakarta post
source : the jakarta post
0 comments:
Post a Comment