President Joko Widodo took office on fight promises against corruption and initiate a mental revolution, but the scammers always find hundreds of people willing to pay bribes in hoping to become officials.
Why pay a bribe to become a low-paid civil servant? Because once in work, you can increase your meager salary being corrupt. This can be seen at various government offices, where some officials may not provide service if a bribe is paid. For example, one of my friends visited the police after being scammed in a real estate transaction, I was told she would have to pay for a survey report.
The sad state of the Indonesian bureaucracy is reflected by the fact that at least 780 people in the West Java province of bribes paid recently from Rp.50 million to Rp.100 million in the hoping to gain positions in the public service, mostly teachers and nurses. Some of the victims said they had sold goods or borrowed to raise the funds.
The police have so far arrested four people over the scam. Two of the suspects are employees, including an employee of the Bureau of the Treasury Ministry of Finance in Bandung. The fraudsters used fake "mission statements" for the jobs of the public service through several cities. Police said one of the authors had collected about Rp.7 billion. The four face charges of fraud, embezzlement and forgery, which carry a collective prison term of 29 years.
Officials in Indonesia
The fraud was discovered on July 29 when the three crooks invite people to a hotel in the capital of Java- West Bandung and asked 420 of them to sign a sheet for the treatment of promised jobs. Most recruits then visited the local office near the National Agency of Public Employees (BKN) to learn about their jobs. BKN officers broke the news that there were no jobs. Police were then called to catch fraudsters.
The Ministry of Administrative and Bureaucratic Reform said the arrests should serve as a wake people that they can not use brokers to buy jobs. The head of the Ministry of Information and the Public Service, Suryatman Herman said that fraud had tarnished the bureaucratic reform process.
The level of fraud is surprising, given that the government in January imposed a five-year moratorium on the recruitment of officials in an effort to reduce the notoriously inefficient state bureaucracy.
The administrative and bureaucratic reform Yuddy Chrisnandi minister said the moratorium was requested by Vice President Jusuf Kalla to improve efficiency and reduce unnecessary spending on government salaries.
The moratorium does not mean that there are no officials will be recruited. There are exemptions for hiring teachers, teachers, health workers and personnel of law enforcement. "But it is done selectively," said Yuddy, adding that only governors, mayors and regents could apply to recruitment. government departments and agencies are expected to undergo an organizational audit to determine if they have enough staff or need new recruits.
Yuddy, member of Hanura former General Wiranto Party, said the police must unmask the perpetrators of the recent fraud and return all the money to the victims. He added that all state officials involved in recruitment scams will be dismissed - if they are convicted of fraud. So far, police have identified the suspects only by their initials.
The Minister said it was easy for people to become victims of fraud, partly because everyone does not have access to information in the media. He said that Indonesian society has become too oriented jobs in the public service, while entrepreneurship remains low, and there are insufficient jobs in the business sector.
He urged people not to be fooled by scammers, noting that efforts by officers to attract people to apply for public service jobs are a big lie. He said that although teachers and medical staff are still urgently needed in some areas, they can not be recruited by mechanisms and formal procedures in accordance with regulations. In other words, bribes should not be paid for a job.
The administrative and bureaucratic reform minister Yuddy Chrisnandi
Compared to other countries in Southeast Asia, Indonesia has no huge public service. There were about 4.46 million employees in 2013, including some 500,000 soldiers and police. That leaves about 4 million employees - less than 2 percent of the population of 250 million inhabitants. Despite the relatively low ratio, the public service is a drain on the state budget. Much of the development programs and education funding eventually go on administrative costs.
According to the Indonesian Forum for Budget Transparency, spending on government salaries increased Rp.43.6 trillion in 2014 from the previous year, compared with an increase of only Rp.13.2 billion in development expenditures.
Some departments seem to be keen to initiate change for change and additional funding, rather than improving service. For example, immigration offices have recently changed the visa application process and extensions. It is now much longer and costs more to extend a visa. Complete a visa form, collecting stamps from different officials and the payment can take seven hours if an immigration office is in snail mode. The last time I complained about this, I was told that I could just "use an agent" to do the job faster. In other words, pay above the official costs so that a matchmaker can bribe officials to do their jobs. There are banners outside immigration offices, urging people not to use the services of agents - but there are still many agents there, handing bribes
.There are many genuine attempts to positive reform but they sometimes seem to be sabotaged. For example, visitors from certain government agencies are expected to take an electronic printed number and wait in a queue to be called - so that the service will be based on the arrival time rather than bribes. But in many buildings, these electronic digital distributors are broken for months at a time.
high level of bureaucratic paperwork Indonesia is a major obstacle to foreign investment and the necessary infrastructure development.
The political and economic risk consultancy based in Hong Kong (PERC) ranked Indonesia as having the second worst bureaucracy in Asia after India.
PERC noted that some bureaucracies have become power centers in their own right, allowing them to resist reform efforts of politicians and civil servants.
Efforts have been made to reduce bureaucratic waste, such as prohibiting government officials from holding meetings funded by taxpayers in hotels, but as long as people always think the job function public are based on bribes rather than merit, much remains to be done.