In several recent surveys of Indonesians about their level of trust in various government institutions, the Indonesian police have received some of the lowest scores – a sign of the public’s general perception that the country’s law enforcers are corrupt. National Police Chief Tito Karnavian has promised to crack down on corruption within his force and we’re starting to see some of the concrete results of those plans.
The National Police’s head of public relations, Commissioner Martinus Sitompul, said internal affairs had recently undergone a two-week operation to crackdown on regional police offices known for soliciting bribes from the public.
The results of their investigations found 69 separate cases of bribery and extortion carried out by 85 police officers.
The largest number of incidents came from Jakarta, where 33 cases of bribery were uncovered. Numerous cases were found in North Sumatra, West Java, Bengkulu, West Nusa Tenggara and Gorontalo as well.
According to Martinus, the head of the National Police’s internal affairs division has sent letters to the regional police chiefs in charge of the accused officers. The regional chiefs have been instructed to pursue the cases, and if they do not, internal affairs will begin investigating them.
Matinus said most of the incidents involved police officers telling citizens they had to pay various illegal fees, like those needed to speed up the process of getting their driver’s licenses, or soliciting bribes in order to avoid tickets.
The commissioner added that citizens had their part to play in preventing corruption. “People should refuse [the police] if there are attempts at extortion to speed up the licensing process,” he said as quoted by Tempo.
