The firestorm of controversy surrounding the House Budget Committee continued to rage on Friday, as allies and critics weighed in on its decision to freeze budget talks in anger over its treatment by antigraft investigators.
In the wake of the decision to suspend talks on next year’s budget in protest of questioning by the Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK), House Deputy Speaker Priyo Budi Santoso, from the Golkar Party, said the KPK was unfairly singling out the committee.
A former committee head, Harry Azhar Azis, also from Golkar, said the whole body had been unjustly tarred with the same brush. “You can’t say the whole committee is doing it,” he said. “The KPK must focus on [certain individuals].”
The antigraft body is investigating allegations of bid-rigging in at least two ministries that have implicated members of the Budget Committee, whose names have not been released.
Earlier in the week, the KPK had summoned Melchias Markus — Harry’s successor as Budget Committee chairman and a fellow Golkar politician — and his deputies for questioning.
Late on Wednesday, Melchias announced the suspension of talks on the 2012 state budget to protest the scrutiny.
That prompted a warning on Thursday from another House deputy speaker, Pramono Anung, from the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P), that a budget disruption could cause serious delays to national development programs.
Priyo, the deputy speaker from Golkar, said he supported the suspension of budget talks because of the “criminalization” the committee faced from the KPK.
He asked why only the committee leaders, and not the ministers implicated in the bid-rigging scandals, had been questioned.
“Why is the committee taking basically all the blame? It can’t be comfortable for them,” he said.
Mahfudz Siddik, the head of House Commission I, which oversees foreign and defense affairs, said the finance minister should also be questioned because his office had been involved in discussions on budget allocations.
“Even President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono should be investigated because he’s the one who signs off on the budget decisions,” said Mahfudz, from the Prosperous Justice Party (PKS).
Antigraft activists called the suspension of budget talks a “selfish and arrogant” move on the part of the committee.
“It only reflects their arrogance and is aimed at diverting public attention away from allegations of the budget mafia operating at the House,” said Apung Widadi, a researcher with Indonesia Corruption Watch.
“The KPK didn’t quiz them as suspects,” he added. “It was perfectly normal and shouldn’t have been politicized.”
He said he was concerned the House would use a meeting with the KPK, scheduled for Monday, to threaten budget cuts for the antigraft agency.
Ronald Rofiandri, a director at the nongovernmental Center for Indonesian Law and Policy Studies (PSHK), said that suspending discussions on the state budget went against the House’s constitutional mandate.
“With Melchias and his friends leaving the budget discussions to the House speaker, they are violating the Law on Legislative Bodies,” he said. “Only the Budget Committee can discuss the budget. This is an overreaction by the committee.”
Also, he said, everything lawmakers do, from passing legislation to approving the budget, should be done in the framework of representing the people.
“Whatever is done by the House, as well as the Budget Commitee, it should be made accountable to the public,” he said.
Priyo said the House leadership had scheduled a series of meetings next week with concerned parties, including the KPK, to find a way out of the impasse.